LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



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MEMORIES 




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MEMORIES OF THE LIFE 



OF 



CALVIN SEARS HARRINGTON, D.D. 



LATE PROFESSOR OF LATIN IN WESLEY AN UNIVERSITY. 



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BY HIS WIFE 






r APR 231887 J/ 1 



MIDDLETOWN, CONN. 
PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR. 

1887 



THE LIBRARY 
OF CONGRESS 

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COPYRIGHT, l88 7 . 



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FRAJ.KUN press: 
BOSTON- 



PREFACE, 



DURING the last few months of Mr. Harrington's life, 
the assurance that he was rapidly hastening away 
gave all his words an especial value to me, and led to the 
habit, unnoticed by him, of committing them to bits of 
paper for future perusal. After he went home, I collected 
and copied these writings, and shared the pleasure they 
gave me with a few friends. Influenced by the interest 
they awakened, and by advice given me, I finally de- 
termined to precede them with a brief outline of my 
husband's history, and thus give them to the public, hop- 
ing they might assist others, fighting the same fight of 

faith, in winning the same final victory. 

E. C. H\ 

Middletown, Conn., Jan. 31, 1887. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I. 



Parentage. — Childhood. — Natural Disposition. — Early 

Home. — School-Life. — Desire for Education ... 9 

CHAPTER II. 

Beginning to Teach. — Conversion. — Journal. — Reli- 
gious Experience 15 

CHAPTER III. 

Seminary Life. — Student at Wesleyan. — Vacations. — 
" On the Bridge."^— Ambitions. — Fears. — Fore- 
bodings. — Farewells 20 

CHAPTER IV. 

Marriage. — Teaching at Sanbornton Bridge. — Vaca- 
tion.— New Year's Song. — Return to Sanbornton 
Bridge. — Variety of Duties. — Religious Work. — 
Sickness 30 

CHAPTER V. 

Resignation. — Life Question. — Great Falls. — Call to 
Wesleyan. — College Work. — Latin Translations.— 
Church Work. — "Our Colleges" 36 

CHAPTER VI. 

Pastoral Work. — Diary. — Prayer. — Extract from Ser- 
mon. — General Conference 47 



8 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VII. 
European Tour. — Letters, and Extracts from Diaries, 62 

CHAPTER VIII. 

California. — Methodist Hymnal. — "Adventus Secundus." 

— Hymnal -with Tunes. — Extracts from Sermons . 86 

CHAPTER IX. 

Karl. — Birthday Poem. — Letters. — Diaries. — Class- 
Meetings. — Sickness. — Vacation. — Letters. — New- 
Hampshire Conference 103 

CHAPTER X. 

Centennial of Middletown. — Poem. — Vacation. — Diary. 

— Letter. — Partial College Work. — "To Nellie on 
her Wedding-Da y."— Battle with Disease. — What is 
your Life? — Old Church 117 

CHAPTER XI. 
Alumni Meeting at Tilton. — Extracts from Poem . . 127 

CHAPTER XII. 

Examinations and Commencement. — Professor Emeritus. 

— Increasing Weakness. — "The Lord's Leading." — 
Music 137 

CHAPTER XIII. 

Failing Physical and Increasing Spiritual Strength. 

— " Border-Land." — Visits. — Letters. — Kindness of 
Friends. — Preaching. — Heart-Searchings.— Bishop 

— Foss. — Day of Prayer. — Night-Experiences . . . 145 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Hemorrhage. — Prayer. — Daily Routine. — Letters. — 
Hymns. — Calls. — Approach of Death. — Directions. 

— Messages. — Last Prayer-Meeting. — Last Sleep. — 
"Into those Mansions." — Kindness of Friends. — 
Memorial of Faculty 160 



MEMORIES OF THE LIFE 

OF 

CALVIN SEARS HARRINGTON, D.D 



CHAPTER I. 

PARENTAGE. — CHILDHOOD. — NATURAL DISPOSITION. —EARLY 
HOME. — SCHOOL-LIFE. — DESIRE FOR EDUCATION. 

IN the little village of East St. Johnsbury, Vt, close by 
where the noisy Moose River runs over a mill-dam, 
stood the brown cottage that on May 17, 1826, became 
the birthplace of Calvin Sears Harrington. 

His mother was an invalid, of whom his only memo- 
ries were of her crossing her room with feeble steps to 
minister to his childish wants, and sitting by her knee 
while she taught him with her musical voice the songs 
of the Church. When he was six years old, she went 
away to the home of the blessed. 

His father was a stern, conscientious, upright man, 
whose love for his children was manifested in a care for 
their best welfare, rather than in a weak yielding to their 
own desires. When Calvin was four years old, his father 
took him to St. Johnsbury Plain, four miles from home, 
to a kindergarten that had been opened there. While the 
little fellow was busy with blocks and pictures, the parent 
left, and no cries availed to call him back. Calvin was 



io MEMORIES. 

boarded in a house close by, where, too small to sit with 
the family at table, he took his daily meals on a little tin 
plate at the fireside. Thus he spent his first term at 
boarding-school. 

When a little older, his father, with great care, made 
him a fine cart, designed to content him in sport about 
home. For a while the new treasure was highly appre- 
ciated j but one day a playmate displayed the treasures 
of his pockets. " Boston crackers " were a greater rarity 
then than now, and a pocket-full of these, a nice ball of 
string, and some other valuable boyish traps, proved too 
strong a temptation ; and the cart was traded off for the 
crackers and string. When, a few hours later, the boy 
offered to trade back, Calvin's father said, " No I Didn't 
you make a fair trade? Haven't you eaten up the crack- 
ers ? You cannot have your cart again : it belongs to 
Ellery now, and I shall not make you another." The 
large-hearted "Ellery" — now the Hon. E. L. Hibbard 
of Laconia, N.H. — urged the return ; but the inflexible 
parent would by no means allow his boy to lose this 
opportunity to learn that a promise once made was bind- 
ing, and no reason was sufficient to induce one to break 
his word. 

Calvin had an older brother and sister. When he was 
seven years of age, a new mother came to his home, 
bringing with her three daughters and a son. The son 
being about the age of the older brother, they soon 
began to affiliate, and the bevy of four girls found plenty 
in common to unite them ; so the little boy of seven was 
left quite by himself. These circumstances developed in 
him a tendency to melancholy and moroseness, which so 
manifested itself upon his face, and perhaps in his words 



MEMORIES. II 

and acts, that a little girl, visiting in the family one day, 
declared innocently to the crowd, " That boy has got the 
ugly" It may well be imagined that the merriment 
occasioned thus at his expense did not tend to sweeten 
his temper. And in later years, when he was sometimes 
told that his disposition was naturally amiable, and he 
did not have to strive so hard as many others to over- 
come evil tempers, he would declare that naturally no 
one had " the ugly " more surely than himself, and none 
but himself knew how constant and severe was the battle 
with the Tempter, or how wonderful the grace of God 
that enabled him to triumph. Constitutionally he was a 
man of anxious care, and one must watch him through 
years of experience to discern that it was the indwelling 
Christ that kept his life calm and peaceful. He often 
said, "The Christian course is a warfare, and must 
always be, however great the grace given to aid in the 
fight against evil." 

The same thought is frequently expressed in his diary, 
as : " The conflict of the world and the flesh and the 
Devil against God and the soul is a terrible one. If man 
were any thing less than he is, he would be torn piece- 
meal, and the object of contention would perish in the 
strife. But oh, how sin takes him into the ranks of evil 
when he consents ! — and God becomes his bulwark when 
he flies there for refuge." 

Another date has : " Battle ! Battle ! Christ is our 
Leader. Foes are within and around me. Through him 
I can be more than conqueror. Oh for a humble trust in 
my Saviour, for a meek and lowly mind, for a patient and 
quiet spirit ! O Lord, sanctify thy servant. Give me a 
holy heart. 



12 MEMORIES. 

" Fight, fight, fight ! I am tired of it. It is of no use to 
quarrel with the decrees of law, wherever they originate. 
Submit is the word. Man is a living interrogation-point, 
and very crooked he is." 

Father Harrington's cottage-home stood at the base of 
one of the greenest of Vermont hills ; and his farm stretch- 
ing back behind it showed on the lowlands well-culti- 
vated gardens and fields, where digging and sowing and 
raking and hoeing furnished plenty of opportunity to 
teach a boy that labor was both necessary and honorable. 
Wide pastures farther up the ascent gave room for berry- 
picking and cattle-driving, and the heavy woodland at 
the top furnished chopping and sledding for winter's 
occupation. The beautiful grove of maples, called "First 
Woods/' half-way up the hill, was attractive for its ice- 
cold spring, that furnished the house below with water, 
and was the rallying-place for the whole herd of cattle as 
they came each night in procession down the well-beaten 
path. In the season for farm -work this Vermont boy was 
never unoccupied, except when on some rare occasion, 
having persuaded his father to give him a " stint," he 
had with youthful zeal accomplished two hours work in 
one, and so saved the afternoon for fishing, gaming, or 
other of the myriad boy-sports from which labor had by 
no means taken his relish. 

But there would sometimes come an end to the rush of 
farm-work. Father Harrington had provided for all such 
emergencies. Beside the stream in front of the house 
stood a tannery and a small shoe-manufactory ; and over 
the dashing current an old bark-mill hung, where hours 
otherwise unoccupied were spent in grinding bark. This 
was a work Calvin especially hated, as the dust filled his 



MEMORIES. 13 

nose and throat, while the din of the machinery, as the old 
mill creaked and groaned at its labor, was any thing but 
pleasing. Still hour after hour, keeping the hopper filled 
to its utmost, he contented himself by leaning from the 
window over the falling water, and raising his voice to its 
highest pitch, vying with the sounds about him, as he 
sang all the songs of his boy-programme, including many 
of the hymns of the hymn-book. 

The evenings were mainly spent in reading, the facili- 
ties for which he used every means to gain. The old 
family library was culled over and over, and all the variety 
from Arabian tales, and Robinson Crusoe, to Rollings 
Ancient History, and John Bunyan's dream, were eagerly 
devoured. By some boy-trade he became possessed of 
his first appreciable sum of money. Richer than Roth- 
schild in feeling, he walked the next leisure afternoon four 
miles to the nearest book-store, and invested this fortune 
in three volumes of the British poets, — Pollok's " Course 
of Time," Milton's " Paradise Lost," and Young's "Night 
Thoughts," which furnished the following winter evenings' 
delightful occupation, and, carefully treasured, became the 
nucleus of his future library. 

A few weeks of district school each summer, and a long 
term in winter, he enjoyed with ever-increasing zest. At 
the age of thirteen, he spent his first term at old New- 
bury Seminary. Two of the girls of his home " boarded 
themselves " there, and a boy was a convenient member 
of such a family. Frequently in autumn he attended a 
term of select school in his native village. So, little by 
little, he was laying a foundation for an education that 
from his early childhood he had earnestly coveted. But 
he began to grow impatient at the long delay, as the 



14 MEMORIES, 

years of farming and tanning went on, and he became 
aware that he was reaching up to manhood, and his 
progress toward the goal of his ambition was scarcely 
perceptible. 

In the winter of 1844 and 1845 ne taught his first 
school in Bath, N.H., and the following spring spent his 
well-earned money in a term of study in St. Johnsbury 
Academy, then in charge of Professor Colby. 

The following summer, coming in one day from farm- 
work, discouraged with the kind of life he was leading, 
and quite out of sorts with the world in general, he called 
out to his father, who sat quietly reading, " Father, I wish 
you would buy me a watch." — " Well, I shall not," re- 
plied the wise parent. "Then I wish you would send 
me to school," Calvin continued. After a few minutes of 
silence, his father answered, " If you will work well this 
summer, you may go to school this fall ; then, if you can 
teach in the winter, you may go to school as long as you 
can pay your own way." This was the " proclamation of 
emancipation " to the petitioner. He mowed and raked, 
and tumbled and pitched off, during the remaining hay- 
ing and harvest season, with a courage and will he had 
never shown before. 



CHAPTER II. 

BEGINNING TO TEACH. — CONVERSION. — JOURNAL. — RELI- 
GIOUS EXPERIENCE. 

AFTER enjoying the fall term at the academy at 
St. Johnsbury Plain, he engaged a school for the 
winter in "Ross District/' Lower Waterford, Vt, and 
then really began the work of teaching that only ended 
with his life. During this winter, boarding at some dis- 
tance from his work, he spent the hour of intermission 
in his schoolroom. Soon after the term commenced, he 
began to look around for something to occupy this com- 
paratively quiet and leisure hour. Finding at hand only 
the Bible, aside from ordinary text-books, he bethought 
him that though he had always read and heard the Bible 
read daily, had studied it also from his childhood in 
Sunday school, still he had never given it a really thought- 
ful perusal. After turning over the leaves a little, he 
decided that he would spend this leisure midday hour in 
reading carefully and thoughtfully the Psalms of David. 
Putting this resolution in practice, he found his attention 
absorbed and his interest fastened more and more on 
those wonderful truths and poetical utterances. The 
words of inspiration did not fail to reveal their power, 
and to stamp their impress on the young inquirer's heart. 
One evening, after his duties for the day were ended, 
as he sat alone in the little chamber at his boarding-place, 
he thought of his Christian home, of the house of God 



16 MEMORIES. 

where he had year after year sung songs of worship, of 
the sabbath school and its instructions, of the many lives 
that he knew as having a Christian faith and experience 
that he had not ; and he asked himself, " Why am not I a 
Christian ?" He could give no answer. His conscience 
told him that it was not only the most reasonable thing 
to serve God, but that the Author of his being and the 
Source of all his blessings had- a rightful claim upon his 
service, that heretofore he had utterly disregarded. He 
saw the unjust position he had been holding, and de- 
liberately decided he would no longer be inconsistent 
with himself. Since he believed he owed his life to his 
Maker, he would henceforth pay his honest dues to Him 
who held this infinite claim. Having deliberately made 
up his mind thus, he kneeled, and formally gave himself 
to God ; then retired to rest with a heart calm, unmoved, 
but satisfied in having done the present duty. 

The week ended, and he went home, as usual, to spend 
the sabbath. He found the little village of East St. 
Johnsbury all awake to the interests of the Christian reli- 
gion. Daily meetings were being held, and on Saturday 
evening he made his way to the chapel where the villagers 
were assembled. The earnest prayers and songs of praise 
to the great Father, and the simple testimonies to a faith 
in Christ Jesus that brought peace to troubled hearts, all 
had their convincing effect on one already decided to 
do the bidding of the Divine Master ; so that, when an 
opportunity was given, he scarcely needed the earnest 
glance of a dear brother to induce him to bow at the 
altar where public consecration was made to God. After 
the prayers, his voice calmly told the purpose of his life 
henceforth. And on Monday morning he went back to 



MEMORIES, 17 

his school, full of a new zeal and readiness to be all for 
Christ ; saying to his brother, on the way, " I don't know 
but I shall some time find it is my duty to become a 
preacher of the gospel." 

Six months later, June 28, 1846, this entry was made 
in his journal : — 

" For the first time in my life, I have to-day partaken 
of the holy sacrament. I can scarcely describe my feel- 
ings when kneeling at the table of my Lord. They were 
of a mingled character. I felt that I was unworthy to 
take even the crumbs that fall from his table. I felt 
humble and solemn and penitent. At the altar my prayer 
was for pardon through Jesus' death and sufferings, and a 
perfect cleansing from all sin through the efficacy of his 
blood. Upon my seat afterward, my inward prayer was, 
6 Hereafter, O Lord, enable me to do all thy righteous 
will.' I do desire to be more holy. I am far from being 
satisfied with my present situation. I am not filled with 
all the fulness of Christ, not devoted enough to his cause, 
not trusting enough in his merits, not enough dead unto 
sin and alive unto God. Oh that from this time no power 
of temptation may cause me to fall, no artifice of the 
Devil may lead me astray from the path of duty and 
the way of peace ! " 

There was so little emotion, so little of the frequently 
attendant joy, at the time of his conversion, that some- 
times, in the few years following, he wondered if he could 
be professing a faith which had no experimental reality. 
This fear at times was painful to him, when he compared 
his own experience with the more emotional one of some 
of his associates. In the fall of 1847 ne attended a 



1 8 MEMORIES. 

• 

camp-meeting at which the power of the Holy Spirit was 
especially manifest. There he sought a satisfactory evi- 
dence that the real work of God was wrought in his own 
heart. One evening, as he was praying for this in the 
midst of a little circle in one of the tents, his prayer was 
suddenly changed to praise. The quiet tones that so 
uniformly told his desires to God were replaced by halle- 
lujahs and shouts of " Glory!" For some minutes the 
place was indeed "shaken where we were assembled," as 
in the olden time, while the presence and power of the 
Holy Ghost was manifest to all. 

In describing afterward his feelings at that time, Calvin 
said, " I cannot tell how it came : I only know that while 
I prayed it seemed to fall on me as a shower, and to 
cover me from head to foot/' That experience he always 
loved to recall as a time when God gave him an especial 
token and proof of his sonship in revealing to him a little 
of the power and glory of his grace. It was the only 
time in all his experience when the manifestation of his 
emotion could have been called noisy. Though often in 
later years he was filled with the conscious presence of 
Christ, he expressed it quietly, — sometimes in tears of joy, 
sometimes in glad songs of praise. 

The following New Year's Day, Jan. i, 1848, his diary 
has this entry : — 

" Believing, as I do, that ' to fear God and keep his 
commandments is the whole duty of man/ I have thought 
it best to form some rules for my own government, and to 
prescribe for myself some duties which it shall be my 
endeavor to perform. 

" 1 . I will endeavor to be a Christian, — to love God 



MEMORIES. 19 

supremely, to perform every Christian duty made known 
to me, and to 'grow in grace from day to day? 

" 2. I will for this end set apart at least two seasons 
every day for secret prayer, self-examination, and reading 
the Scriptures. 

"3. I will never parley with the adversary, but en- 
deavor to shun the very appearance of evil." 

This short but comprehensive code of rules, so con- 
scientiously adopted, was never afterward renounced. 



CHAPTER III. 

SEMINARY LIFE. — STUDENT AT WESLEYAN. — VACATIONS. — 
" ON THE BRIDGE." — AMBITIONS. — FEARS. — FOREBODINGS. 
— FAREWELLS. 

IN the spring of 1846, Calvin entered the college pre- 
paratory course in old Newbury Seminary. Here he 
worked with most indefatigable zeal in his studies ; keep- 
ing his health good meanwhile by vigorous engagement in 
baseball, football, snowball, climbing " old Pulaski," and 
taking long and rapid walks through all that mountain 
region. 

From the time of his conversion, though he prized as 
highly as one could all intellectual opportunities, and set 
himself conscientiously to improve all that came within 
his reach, yet above these he set the culture of his spirit- 
ual life. The weekly prayer and class meetings he never 
neglected. The plea of "no time" was never thought 
of ; because, from the outset, he planned time for them, 
just as he planned time for his daily meals and recita- 
tions. This rule of life, that never allowed religious du- 
ties to. yield place to any thing else, early well established, 
in later years made duty a delight. 

He always found time also to seek out and try to help 
those who were forgetting these higher interests, and in 
those years his success in this work was marked. Here, 
as everywhere, his love for music was rendered useful. 
Often an otherwise weary hour of summer midday was 



MEMORIES. 21 

made cheery in that old boarding-house, as, surrounded 
by a crowd of fellow-students, he led their voices in 
chorus, or sang song after song, accompanied by the 
little old-fashioned melodeon which he held upon his 
knees. 

In August, 1848, having completed his course of prep- 
aration for college, he started in the old-time stage- 
coach on his journey to Middletown, Conn. 

Arriving a stranger in the city late in the afternoon, he 
was set down, by the hackman, at the fence-gate on 
High Street, opposite the two old stone piles that then 
constituted the nucleus of the present elegant line of 
university buildings. He went cautiously up the long 
walk, and reverentially looking in at the open door be- 
held the janitor, acting president for the vacation not yet 
ended. He called for a room, and was shown one in 
which the pile of furniture of all sorts, set as if ready for 
the auctioneer's block, reached the ceiling. But in the 
midst of it was one bed dressed for use. He was allowed 
to occupy that for the night. It is doubtful whether his 
waking or sleeping dreams were most tantalizing. The 
ideas he had cherished of Wesleyan University, as the 
centre of all that was attractive and elevating, seemed to 
be some nightmare of the past ; and the memory of 
home, with its cosy chambers, well-furnished tables, and 
loving hearts, was very bright beside this damp-walled, 
unlighted room. 

But " tired nature must have her dues:" so, despite 
the racings of rats and mice and some lesser animals, he 
spent a few hours in sleep, rising early to make prepara- 
ration for the opening term. Dr. Olin, as president of 
the university, answered all his previous ideas of a college 



22 MEMORIES. 

president. Other members of the faculty he soon came 
to regard with the highest deference. And though the 
general surroundings, and the intellectual character of 
many of the students, greatly disappointed him, yet he 
prosecuted the four-years' course with constantly increas- 
ing appreciation not only of the opportunity afforded 
him to gain the book-knowledge he had so long cov- 
eted, but to gain also many other things from the privi- 
leges of college life. Thenceforth his alma mater was 
cherished by him with all the enthusiasm of a child who 
knows the value of real parental care. His eye would 
kindle with excitement, and his voice grow eloquent, 
whenever, in after-years, he used his influence to send 
pupils to old Wesleyan. The beauty of the city, the 
charming walks and delightTul views of the surrounding 
country, the culture of the social world there, and the de- 
lights of college companionship, all were added to the 
strong testimonials of merit he gave to the faculty of the 
university, and the various advantages and privileges con- 
nected with the institution. He was an ardent lover of 
his college society. He often said, " To no one thing in 
all my course do I owe more than to the help I received 
from the Psi Upsilon Fraternity." He loved it as long as 
he lived ; and one of the last messages from his lips was 
sent to " our boys," — as he loved to call them, — urging 
them to a constant course of right-doing and patient 
working. 

As everywhere and always, he made college a work- 
shop. " College life has more truth than poetry in it," 
he used to say. " It is drijl, drill, from Monday morning 
till Saturday night ; and then it is, with me, sing, sing, on 
the sabbath ; so I am about as tired on Monday morning 



MEMORIES. 23 

as on Saturday night." In those days, chapel devotions 
occurred at six, and recitations commenced at a quarter 
past six. This steady plodding from day to day he 
relieved, as often as vacation came round, by visits to his 
childhood home, where he was always gladly welcomed. 
Arriving unexpectedly at one time, after the family had 
retired for the night, he climbed to his own chamber- 
window, and entering enjoyed a fine sleep. When the 
large family circle, to which two younger sisters and a 
brother had been added some years before, were all 
seated at breakfast, he walked quietly into the dining- 
room, and claimed his place among them. The joyful 
breakfast over, word went to the eldest brother, — who had 
married, and lived next door, — that his help was wanted 
to get a strange animal out of the woodshed. Arming him- 
self with a long pole, he at once obeyed the summons, 
and, putting his eye to a crack in the out-house door, 
beheld the young collegian demurely seated on the wood- 
pile. The racings and wrestlings, the laughter and chatter 
that followed, went far towards conquering all dyspeptic 
tendency, and preparing for another year of vigorous study. 

Calvin found here also various means of combining 
good-doing with health-gettting. In the summer of 
1849, a new church was being built in the little village ; 
and, adapting himself to the occasion, he became first 
carpenter by trade, and worked with hammer, square, and 
plane ; then painter, and put on the two coats of white 
that finished and beautified the new house of worship. 

Standing one day on the bridge that spanned the noisy 
stream just below the old bark- mill, calling back the days 
of yore, he composed one of his earliest poems, which he 
entitled, — 



24 MEMORIES. 

ON THE BRIDGE. 

Through a village in the mountains 

Where my boyhood days were passed, 
Rushing down from far-off fountains 

Runs a river clear and fast. 
O'er a chasm deep and narrow, 

Just below the whitened fall, 
Where the torrent like an arrow 

Shoots along the spray-wet wall, 
There a rustic bridge is hanging 

With its airy swaying floor, 
High above the waters, spanning 

All the gulf from shore to shore. 

Bending there low o'er the railing, 

In my boyhood days of dream, 
I have spent the hours in sailing, 

Sailing up the hurrying stream ; 
For to wayward fancy's seeming, 

Gazing on the flood below, 
Through the air I flew in dreaming, 

While the waters ceased to flow ; 
Yet forever when I landed 

From my voyage up the flood, 
There my phantom ship lay stranded 

Where the bridge had always stood. 

Such is life : across time's river 

Thus for each a bridge is thrown ; 
Bending o'er the railing ever, 

Each, enraptured, gazes down, 
And with 'wildered sense believing 

That we fly past vale and hill, 
In our dreams ourselves deceiving ; 

In our places stand we still. 
Thus " the thing that hath been shall be ; " 

Only man grows old and gray, 
And when death shall close our dreaming, 

Only he shall pass away. 



MEMORIES, 25 

The four years in college were in many respects years 
of enjoyment and satisfaction, and yet of much anxious 
care. Several things conspired during the time to foster 
Calvin's natural tendency to melancholy. Exceedingly 
sensitive, his dread of censure was a continual torment. 
He longed for the approval of his friends, and, indeed, of 
all. To feel that any human being had any other than 
kindly feeling toward him, made him wretched. During 
his first year he wrote : " It is natural for me to look 
upon the dark page of life's book. What troubles me 
would not trouble another. Molehills to some are moun- 
tains to me. ' Trifles light as air ' are often magnified to 
things of great importance. It was always so. A word, 
a look, a little act, an imagined neglect, or a seeming 
attention, will cause a world of joy or grief, as the case 
may be." 

His ambition amounted almost to a passion, and was a 
demon he fought through all his life ; and college rival- 
ries did not tend to lessen its strength. To stand second 
in a class of twenty-four, was a fear that often tormented 
him, and a fact, at last, that seemed to him an almost 
unendurable disgrace. The drama "Cromwell," for the 
junior exhibition, he prepared with encouraged ambition ; 
but of the Latin salutatory for graduation he wrote : " I 
have written my Latin jargon short and sweet. I hate it. 
Well, never mind ; it may be all for the best, I presume 
it is. Oh, I have been, and am, I fear, very proud and 
ambitious. When I look at my own heart, I see a thou- 
sand manifestations of vanity and ambitious desire that I 
fear are wrong. How much may I be ambitious ? I want 
to do just right." 

His naturally doubting mind received little help from 



26 MEMORIES. 

the influences about him. Another letter says, " Help me 
by your prayers. You know I am of a doubting nature. 
Strong faith I am almost an entire stranger to. I some- 
times think it is harder for me to be a Christian than for 
any other human being." Again he says, " I was sad last 
evening from a hundred rushing thoughts, and yet scarcely 
one was distinct and definite. I had just returned from 
class- meeting, and I always feel sad after communing with 
my own heart an hour. Oh, how much wickedness is 
there ! how much coldness, and ingratitude, and pride, 
and passion ! I felt sad that I was not rid of the doubt 
and darkness of scepticism, which so greatly hinders me 
from that religious enjoyment I so much long for, — that 
I was so weak and useless a professor of religion. How 
overwhelming is the sense of my utter nothingness, and 
destitution of mental or spiritual endowments and acqui- 
sitions, especially spiritual, as it sometimes comes upon 
me!" 

The great question of his life-work was continually 
recurring to him; and a fear that he should be unable 
in any position to meet life's stern demands and God's 
righteous dues, made him often despondent. 

Once he wrote : " You cannot tell how I shrink, at 
times, from the future, — how I fear to enter upon its 
trials and responsibilities. I always did dread the post of 
responsibility. I fear I may not meet the expectations 
of those who are gazing upon me and criticising. I shrink 
greatly from the voice of censure, and the frowns of a 
cold, heartless multitude." Again, " Oh, the future ! It 
is well, no doubt, I cannot fathom it. No doubt it is wise 
that the Infinite has thrown around it the curtain of thick 
darkness. Yet who does not often long to read the doom 



MEMORIES, 27 

of destiny ? . . . Well, let us console our hearts with the 
recollection that ' He doeth all things well. 7 If we can- 
not live by sight, let us live by faith. I am thankful, that, 
although the destiny of this life is shrouded in impene- 
trable gloom, yet far behind the dark cloud-banks we can 
catch glimpses of the streaming light of the future life. 
Oh for strength to weather every storm on life's ocean, 
that we may at last emerge into the sunlight of God's 
everlasting presence I " 

His financial condition troubled him. At the end of 
the first year he found his small resources exhausted. He 
found also that it was impracticable to spend, as he had 
planned, each winter term out of college. He tried to 
utilize vacations in various ways. Once he attempted 
to canvass for periodicals, but those who knew him would 
be likely to smile at the thought. Unwilling, as he always 
was, to ask a favor, he felt, in this position, like a street 
beggar ; and, never voluble with his tongue, the flippancy 
of a successful canvasser was an acquirement he could not 
gain. 

He taught singing-schools with success during the winter 
vacations, and once made an arrangement to give a course 
of concerts with a friend. After the first evening's experi- 
ment, which proved quite satisfactory, the man, for some 
reason, was unable to meet further engagements ; there- 
fore the vacation tour was an embarrassment instead of a 
help. This led him to abandon all further efforts to pay 
by the way \ but, obtaining a life-insurance policy for the 
safety of his creditors, he thereafter borrowed money, and 
gave his whole care to study. 

About the beginning of the last term he wrote : " I have 
just been making a rough calculation as to the amount of 



28 MEMORIES. 

cash I must have to meet the term's expenses. I presume 
I can borrow it, as I have heretofore. It will leave me, 
when I graduate, six hundred dollars in debt ; but I am 
determined not to be blue about it. I have many things 
to encourage me. My friends will sympathize with me, 
if they cannot help me. I shall be through college with 
health, and hands, and a disposition to work. My Father's 
eye is upon me, and his care about me, and he will do 
with me as seemeth best to the eye of Infinite Wisdom. 
... I don't know what is in the future, but I do know 
that God will do as he has always hitherto done, — deal 
with me far more mercifully than I deserve." 

So as the years sped away his hope brightened, and his 
Christian trust grew more firm. Still undecided in refer- 
ence to his final course, he received near the close of his 
last term a local preacher's license, due, he said, to the 
entreaties of a dear college friend, Rev. J. H. Knowles, 
and to the encouragement of his pastor, Rev. J. M. Reid. 

When the four years drew to a close, there came the 
saddest thing of all, the parting. June 28, a letter says, — 

" Professor Lindsey has come home with his new wife. 
We serenaded the bride the other night, and received a 
nice lot of wedding-cake for our pains. I have a fine 
quartet here in college, and we make the streets vocal 
these moony nights. Oh I am sad enough to cry, some- 
times, when I think that I am soon to leave, and hear no 
more these dear voices of my classmates and my choir. 
I shall never enjoy the like again, I am sure. I wonder 
sometimes if they think half as much of me as I do of 
them. It is hard for me to break the strong ties which 
are so closely and so thickly woven around my heart. 



MEMORIES. 29 

But so goes the world. It is our lot to be torn away 
from a thousand dear things, just as we learn to love 
them. I can't express half I feel, and it would do no 
good if I could. " 

Aug. 2, he wrote again : " I have sung for the last time 
with my choir. I can't keep the tears back when I think 
of it. These years of such associations are no small ties 
to bind my heart. Oh, what a world of partings this is ! 
It is hard 

* to rend the heart 
With the sad thought that we must part, 
And like some low and mournful spell 
To whisper but one word, — Farewell.' 

" Middletown never looked so lovely as now, when I am 
about to leave it." 

Whether his almost constant singing, with his choir, 
and his quartet u on moony nights," had any effect upon 
his future physical condition, he sometimes questioned. 



CHAPTER IV. 

MARRIAGE. — TEACHING AT SANBORNTON BRIDGE. — VACA- 
TION. — NEW - YEAR'S SONG. — RETURN TO SANBORNTON 
BRIDGE.— VARIETY OF DUTIES. — RELIGIOUS WORK.— SICK- 
NESS. 

CALVIN graduated in the class of 1852, and married, 
on Aug. 10 of the same year, Eliza C. Chase of 
Lempster, N. H., then preceptress of New-Hampshire 
Conference Seminary located at Sanbornton Bridge, now 
Tilton. 

On the 24th of that month he began teaching in the 
same school, under the presidency of the late lamented 
Dr. J. E. Latimer of Boston University. Two years he 
taught in that position ; when Professor Latimer left, and 
Professor Harrington took his place, and remained thus 
until July, i860. 

In the year 1856 the old seminary building was demol- 
ished, and replaced by a new one. 

During the erection of the new building, the places 
used as temporary recitation-rooms proving unsuitable 
for winter weather, there was an interposition of one 
term's vacation, which was spent in the quiet home 
among the Lempster hills. It was scarcely a time of 
rest ; for, ready to welcome any call for help, Professor 
Harrington found opportunity to preach every Sunday 
for one month in Brattleborough, Vt., another month in 
Springfield, Mass., and other sabbaths in various pulpits 
in New Hampshire. 



MEMORIES, 31 

He made himself useful also by a thousand services 
done to cheer the hearts of aged parents ; he assisted the 
pastor in revival efforts, and entered into various projects 
for the benefit of the little community where he was wait- 
ing. Money was needed to defray church expenses ; and 
knowing it to be no easy matter for a company of less 
than one hundred, whose only income was what could be 
saved by farming on the backbone of the Old Granite 
State, to raise five hundred dollars a year, he became one 
of the workers in "getting up " a New Year's festival, 
and spent days and evenings in committee-meetings, re- 
hearsals, and musical drills with the young people, for the 
accomplishment of their laudable purposes. Among other 
things he wrote for the occasion a New Year's song, and 
after setting it to music drilled an octet of youthful voices, 
whose final success in rendering it greatly delighted him. 

NEW YEAR'S SONG. 

Hark ! the voice of midnight bells 

Waking echoes far and near ; 
Louder still their music swells, 

Ringing in the glad New Year. 
Tower and spire take up the strain, 

Ice-bound hills send forth reply, 
Watching stars shout back again 

From the chambers of the sky. 

Welcome now ! welcome here ! 

All our voices gayly sing, 
Glad New Year ! Happy New Year ! 

Joy and gladness bring. 

Bursting forth in rival shout, 

Voice of children sweet and clear, 
From the doorways peeping out, 

Hail with us their " Happy New Year ! " 



32 MEMORIES. 

Thus with joy and fond embrace 

Morning dawns to greet the earth ; 
Thus the year with smiling face 

Heralds in his glorious birth. 

Welcome now, etc. 

Hark ! the merry sleigh-bells play 

On the moon-lit evening air; 
Laughing voices join to say, 

Banish sorrow ! Banish care ! 
Gathered in the festive throng, 

Speak we words of social cheer, 
Join we in the general song, 

Welcome to the glad New Year. 

Welcome now, etc. 

Returning to Sanbornton Bridge in the spring of 1857, 
with Rev. Lewis Howard as steward of the boarding 
department, they assumed together the financial respon- 
sibility of the institution, and charge of the new buildings. 

During the following three years, Professor Harrington 
greatly enjoyed the prosperity of the seminary, the church, 
and the village. The number of different students during 
the last year was 360; the last fall term having 170 
in attendance. These were years of great care and 
varied labor. The buildings were ample, the number of 
students was increasing, and every thing was calculated 
to awaken ambition and enthusiastic labor. The whole 
financial strength of the trustees had been expended in 
raising funds to complete the new edifice, and the school 
must now be run on the tuition of the students. This 
afforded full opportunity for exercise of ingenuity and 
financial ability. The ancient languages claimed the 
president's first attention ; but he entered also whatever 



MEMORIES. 33 

other gap was widest. " Necessity is the mother of in- 
vention," was an adage well illustrated in the labora- 
tory of the new building, which afforded many amusing 
proofs of the effort he made to adapt all sorts of traps 
to the furnishing of necessary apparatus for mathematical, 
philosophical, and chemical purposes. These ready, the 
nights were taken, often until late hours, to rehearse 
the experiments for the coming day, lest by any means 
the students might discover that the success of each one 
was as novel and delightful to the professor as to them- 
selves ; for when he was in college there was not, as now, 
a department either of practical chemistry or physics. 

The mineralogical cabinet was unusually respectable 
for a conference seminary ; but in his daily walks during 
the term, and longer rambles in vacation, he went armed 
with hammer and chisel, and many a specimen from the 
various rich veins in New Hampshire, Vermont, Massa- 
chusetts, New York, and Canada, he added to its store. 
Evening lectures on all departments of science, as well as 
on music, reading, general culture, etc., were added to 
the daily routine ; and class and prayer meetings claimed 
always one evening each per week. 

His interest for his pupils reached beyond their mental 
needs. He longed for their spiritual good. During the 
last years of his stay in the seminary, he had the habit, 
after the school was fairly launched on a new term, of tak- 
ing his roll-book, and by a private mark designating those 
who were not Christians ; and afterwards they were, one 
by one, made especial subjects of his prayers and labors. 
He caused to be formed, among the working Christians, 
bands of about a dozen each, one of which he led him- 
self. These met for a half-hour daily, and prayed for the 



34 MEMORIES, 

conversion of their fellow-students. And term after term 
was marked by the answers to these prayers, and the 
adding of these especial subjects to the same bands, 
until they were filled to overflowing. From time to time, 
he baptized such converts. Near the close of one term, 
there were eighteen whom he thus consecrated on one 
sabbath to the service of the Master. 

In the winter of 1858-59, during a course of lectures 
he was giving to the school and village community, he 
contracted a severe cold, which resulted in a fearful 
attack of pleuro-pneumonia. He was recovering slowly, 
when advised by his physician to go away from the 
seminary, that, securing rest both of mind and body, he 
might the more speedily regain complete health. He 
accordingly went to his father's at East St. Johnsbury, 
where, the day after his arrival, he was seized with violent 
relapse of the disease, so that his life was despaired of. 
Being told that his wife would come on the evening stage, 
he insisted on leaving his bed, and dressing for the occa- 
sion ; and when she entered the house he stood in dress- 
coat and boots in the door of his room, leaning on a 
support, looking more like a spirit departed than a living 
body. It required few words to lead him back to his 
bed, which he did not leave again for many days. All 
the symptoms were so alarming, that most discouraging 
words went back to the seminary. On the evening of the 
weekly prayer-meeting, " prayer was made without ceas- 
ing, of the church, unto God for him." Rev. W. D. Cass, 
then a strong man in the New-Hampshire Conference, 
and a trustee of the seminary, prayed with such fervor 
and manifest faith, that those present felt that the throne 
of God was reached. When he arose from his knees, he 



MEMORIES. 35 

said, " I have got the victory. Brother Harrington will 
be restored to us." The next morning — though, of 
course, we knew nothing of all this — we saw a decided 
change for the better; and from that time he steadily 
improved, and very rapidly. In less than a month, he 
was back in his place doing all his work as before. 

Those eight years of labor in New Hampshire enabled 
him to pay off his college debt, and gave him the privi- 
lege of contributing several hundred dollars to the new 
school edifice, and nearly as much to the new Methodist- 
Episcopal Church in the village. They gave him also a 
home in the hearts of hundreds of young people who 
came under his influence, a wealth of friends, who from 
that time onward were continually meeting and cheering 
him wherever he went. They furnished him means to 
support his family during nine months of rest, and, after a 
pastorate of three months, to bring him to his next field 
of labor with much well-earned experience, and some- 
thing less than one hundred dollars as his whole earthly 
store. They gave him a wealth of memories, which were 
always sacredly cherished, and often mentioned as causes 
of gratitude. The families in which we boarded there, he 
used to call " our homes," and their members he regarded 
as kindred. 



CHAPTER V. 

RESIGNATION. — LIFE-QUESTION. — GREAT FALLS. — CALL TO 
WESLEYAN. — COLLEGE-WORK. — LATIN TRANSLATIONS. — 
CHURCH-WORK. — « OUR COLLEGES." 

IN June, i860, he resigned his position in New- Hamp- 
shire Conference Seminary, and spent the following 
nine months in visiting, travelling, and general recruiting. 
He was a member of New- Hampshire Conference ; had 
received the ordination of deacon in 1857 at the hands 
of Bishop Morris, and of elder in 1859, from Bishop 
Ames. He had never, however, fully settled the question 
whether he ought to remain a teacher, or to take work as 
a travelling preacher. He was not satisfied that he had a 
certain call to the active ministry, and feared his talents 
not adapted to public speaking. During these nine 
months of comparative leisure, he made the subject one 
of constant prayer and thought. And yet, when the 
time of Conference approached, he had no settled con- 
victions on the matter. He said, " I will put myself in 
the hands of the Church, and wait further the indications 
of Providence." 

He was appointed to High-street Church, Great Falls/ 
N.H. He entered upon his duties with real zest, and 
for three months greatly enjoyed the position of pastor, 
and, receiving cordial support from his people, was getting 
quite at home in the pulpit ; when an unexpected elec- 
tion to the chair of the Greek professorship in Wesleyan 



MEMORIES. 37 

University made him again consider the all-important 
question of his life-work. It was not long before it was 
finally settled ; and, feeling now sure that this was the 
call of God, after amicably adjusting the matter with his 
people at Great Falls, he accepted the position, and re- 
moved to Middletown, Conn., in August, 1861. 

Great Falls he remembered always with much pleasure 
as being the locality of the first home in his own hired 
house, the birthplace of his boy, the short pastorate 
where he had enjoyed for a very brief time the wealth of 
Christian communion and sympathy that is felt between 
pastor and people in one of the best of the New-England 
Methodist churches, and the place where a kind Provi- 
dence finally wrought out for him the settlement of the 
great question of his life-work. 

In August, 1 86 1, he entered upon his duties as professor 
of Greek in Wesleyan University. 

At the end of two years, after having become increas- 
ingly in love with the Greek tongue, by some process of 
evolution another professorship was vacated, and he was 
transferred from the Greek to the department of Latin, 
which had formerly been his favorite study. From this 
time he bent all his energies to perfecting his knowledge 
of that language \ and though repeatedly compelled to 
add classes outside of this regular work, — as history, po- 
litical economy, or Constitution, — he always did it under 
a mental protest, feeling that every thing of that sort was 
defrauding him of his opportunity to accomplish the most 
possible for his own department. His devotion to his 
college work was a religious one. No weariness of body, 
call of company, or any outside attraction, could induce 
him to leave a recitation. When told sometimes that he 



38 MEMORIES. 

might be more popular with the boys if he would " give 
them a cut" occasionally, he would say, "I don't know 
how I am to keep a good conscience when I neglect any 
regular duty for a trivial cause." And this work was not 
irksome. Every year he loved it better ; and even after 
disease had seriously depleted his strength, he went still 
with great pleasure to his college " sanctum," very often 
thanking God that he was still able to pursue his chosen 
calling. 

Of the Latin he never tired, but from year to year his 
fondness for the old tongue increased. He frequently 
amused himself by translating from Latin to English verse. 
The "Methodist Quarterly Review" for October, 1870, 
has an article on "The Ethics of Latin Comedy," in 
which some score of extracts are thus rendered. Several 
old Latin hymns, anglicised in verse, are found among his 
papers. The following hymn of Peter the Venerable is 
a good example of the effort he enjoyed to preserve in 
English rhyme the poetic measure of the Latin : — 

DE RESURRECTIONE DOMINI. 

Pone hictum, Magdalena, 
Et serena lacrymas. 

Cease thy sorrow, Magdalena, 

Tearless lift thy beaming brow ; 
Tis no more the feast of Simon, 

Causeless is thy weeping now. 
Thousand reasons challenge gladness, 
Exultation now for sadness. 

Halleluia ! 

Summon laughter, Magdalena, 

Let thy kindling face grow bright ; 
All thy suffering has departed, 

Gleams again the glowing light. 



MEMORIES. 39 

Lo ! the world unchained through Jesus, 
Triumphing, from death he frees us. 

Halleluia ! 

Shout for joy, O Magdalena ! 

Christ has left the gloomy grave ; 
Finished is the sad transaction, 

Death destroyed, He comes to save. 
Whom with grief thou sawest dying, 
Greet with smiles, the tomb defying. 

Halleluia ! 

Lift thine eyes, O Magdalena ! 

Lo ! thy Lord before thee stands ; 
See ! how fair the thorn-crowned forehead ; 

Mark his feet, his side, his hands. 
Glow his wounds with pearly whiteness, 
Hallowing life with heavenly brightness. 

Halleluia ! 

Wake and live, O Magdalena ! 

Now thy night is changed to day ; 
Let thy heart swell with rejoicing, 

Death's strong arm is dashed away. 
Grief and lamentation spurning, 
Hail thy loving joys returning. 

Halleluia ! 

He often used his moments of vacation recreation in 
reading rare old Latin authors, as his most pleasant pas- 
time. It was interesting to him to see how they verified 
the words of Solomon, " There is no new thing under the 
sun." He would often break out with a laugh, saying, 
" Here it is again ! such or such a modern theory is 
only a rehash of what this old Latin fellow wrote centuries 
ago." His article on Lucretius, in the "Quarterly" for 
January, 1876, claims that the philosophy of this ancient 
poet, " in its essential features, in its merits which have 



40 MEMORIES. 

stood the test of centuries, and in its failures which are 
common to all who have followed him, is the prototype of 
all subsequent materialistic philosophy/ ' 

In his college life, as well as elsewhere, he made his 
duties to the Church of God of paramount importance. 
So far from finding these to require any neglect of col- 
lege work, he used to say that the one aided the other. 
As the mental and spiritual nature complemented each 
other, so the labors of each mutually increased their 
capacity. He thought that college life, instead of tend- 
ing, as he saw it often did, to lowering the standard of 
morality and religion, ought to be always an incentive to 
greater and more manifest spiritual power. He believed 
the design of college founders was only thus accom- 
plished. The intensity of his feeling on this subject 
found expression in an article published in " The Meth- 
odist Quarterly" of October, 1879, entitled "Our Col- 
eges," from which are the following extracts : — 

" There can be no question that the original purpose 
of the college was mainly as an auxiliary to religion. 
Whatever may have been its design as a means of mental 
culture, the dominant one was to promote the cause of 
Christ. The founders of these institutions in our early 
history were eminently pious men. Their chief thought 
in their noble work was to inaugurate a powerful agency 
of an aggressive Christianity. No doubt they believed, 
what is true, that the college as a means of liberal cul- 
ture, as a centre of intellectual power whose utterances 
should exercise an authoritative control upon the popular 
mind, and as a discoverer and disseminator of useful 
knowledge, would be such an agency in a very high 



MEMORIES. 41 

sense. But that culture, intellect, and knowledge, with- 
out the vitalizing forces of religion, would realize their 
intent in the founding of a college, never entered their 
minds. Academic culture was rather the instrument of 
religion \ a blade of cold steel, that must be tempered 
in the blood of Christ if it would do any real service to 
humanity. Education was not regarded as a Christian- 
izing force, except in the hands of religion. Every effort 
to promote the one, from the common school to the col- 
lege, was made on the belief that it was the outgrowth 
and auxiliary of the other. A large part of the funds 
given to found William and Mary College were given as 
a missionary donation, and conditioned on such an appli- 
cation of them. The seal of Harvard bears the motto, 
1 Christo et Ecclesice' The seal of Yale has the words, 
1 Lux et Veritas ; ' and what other light and truth than 
that of the Holy Scriptures were in the thought of the 
ten clergymen who laid the foundation of that beacon 
on our shores ? Dartmouth College began as an Indian 
mission. The announced purpose of the Synod of New 
York in founding Princeton College was, ' to supply the 
Church with learned and able preachers of the Word.' 
President Witherspoon well embodied its spirit in the 
words : ' Cursed be all that learning that is contrary to 
the cross of Christ; cursed be all that learning that is 
not coincident with the cross of Christ ; cursed be all 
that learning that is not subservient to the cross of 
Christ.' There is not a New-England college but is the 
result of the religious enthusiasm of its founders as a 
means primarily of defending and propagating the gos- 
pel. A large number of Western colleges are missionary 
enterprises, designed to furnish a supply of pious and 



42 MEMORIES. 

learned ministers in those new and growing regions. And 
the history of the very few institutions that have been 
founded in irreligion shows them a failure until they 
have passed under the controlling influence of religion. 
The founders of Methodist institutions were men of 
whom it would be sacrilege to suppose that they did not 
intend them to be directly, as well as indirectly, a power 
for Christ. They are the children of the Church, born 
and baptized with the hope and purpose that they should 
become the giants of her advancing armies, and the 
invincible bulwarks of her defence. . . . 

" An unchristian man, or a man of doubtful religious 
character, much more a man of well-known sceptical 
opinions or an irreligious life, should have no place in 
a board of college instruction. Without doubt, such an 
opinion will be met with the charge of bigotry and illib- 
erality. These are days in which men are exceedingly 
sensitive to such a charge. The glamour of liberalism 
charms like a Circe, and petrifies like a Gorgon. To be 
called narrow, is to be reckoned in conflict with the ad- 
vancing tread of the ages ; and to be called an adherent 
of the old-time faith, and pious after the Puritan fashion, 
is to be called narrow. Broadness is deified. Strip off 
the angelic garb from our Satan, and his name is Liberal- 
ism ; and it becomes Christianity to do what it can to 
disrobe him. . . . 

" We are no advocate of a dogmatic Christianity, nor 
of religious asceticism. The college is not a monastery. 
Its chief function is the culture of the intellect, through 
the channels of art, science, and language. But these 
channels will inevitably carry a moral current too. It is 
the solemn duty of a Christian college to see to it that its 



MEMORIES. 43 

moral teaching be pure. It needs no parade of religious 
profession, no offensive boasts of its religious character. 
It should be as unostentatious as true religion always is ; 
but it should be as firm as the hills in its principles, and 
well known by its fruits. . . . 

" There is no goal like a Christian goal, no purpose like 
a Christian purpose. There is no antidote for instability, 
discouragement, and defeat, like Christian principle. If 
the atmosphere of a college is helpful for this, its students 
stand on the highest vantage-ground. In proportion as 
a college possesses this positive and leading element, will 
the standard of its culture rise, and the results of its 
mission be accomplished. . . . 

" It is one of the most serious errors of the day, that the 
educational system of our country ought to be divested of 
the religious element ; that this element of itself, and by 
itself, and in its own specific channels, is sufficient for the 
religious welfare of the young. Nothing is more strange 
than such an idea in a Christian country. Nothing but 
the hypocrisy of Romanism, seconded by the demagogism 
of politics, could have given it such currency. The very 
heathen have a better theory. The Constitution of Ly- 
curgus made the morals of the Spartan child, after their 
standard of morality, the principal thing in their educa- 
tion. Philip of Macedon thanked the gods, upon the 
birth of Alexander, not so much that they had given him 
a son, as that Aristotle might be his instructor ; and none 
like Aristotle comprehended the immortal nature of man, 
and strove to mould his pupils by that lofty conception. 
The Chinese blend religious with secular instruction, and 
the Persians teach their children virtue as the best of all 
knowledge. The Christianity of history has never dared 



44 MEMORIES. 

separate religion and education. From Jesuit to Puritan, 
the theory and practice of education have regarded reli- 
gion as the most positive and direct of its forces. It is 
reserved for the last half of the nineteenth century, and 
the most Christian of all lands, to maintain, that, in the 
most critical of character-forming processes and periods, 
it is safe to withdraw the power of a positive religious 
influence. As though any event of life should go on 
without it ! And so men who would be conscience-smit- 
ten not to ask the blessing of God upon every meal, think 
it unimportant that the word of God and prayer should 
introduce the daily transactions of a school or college. 
It is dangerous business to make the prayers of Sunday 
last for the week ; it is equally dangerous to offset an extra 
amount of religion in the family and Sunday school, against 
a minus quantity in the halls of secular education. . , . 
In the direction in which we are urging the sphere of the 
college, is there that active sympathy in the Church which 
the case demands? The college expects, and, no doubt, 
receives, the prayers of those Christian fathers and mothers 
whose sons are enjoying its privileges. Other ties than 
those that link the Church and the college secure them. 
But is the mind of the Church at all awake to the impor- 
tance of the relationship ? Does it half realize the power 
of the college for good or evil, its conservative and ag- 
gressive influence for Christ, its grasp on the Christian 
pulpit, its plastic power on educated mind, and, through 
this, on the less-thinking masses ? Is not the most exclu- 
sive idea about them, in the popular mind, that they are 
simply intellectual gymnasia, — that if they have a good 
moral tone, it is well ; if not, it is a necessary evil ? Do 
they know that their highest need is a stream of prayer 



MEMORIES. 45 

from the whole Church, whose constant, mighty flow shall 
flood them with a divine light and life ? That such a need 
is partially felt, is seen in the establishment and observ- 
ance of the day of prayer for colleges. That such a day 
should have been thought desirable, is high proof of their 
importance in many minds. But how many of the churches 
observe this day by any suitable exercise of worship ? How 
many family altars and secret closets burn with sacrifice on 
that day ? Possibly it is more widely observed than we 
know, but it is to be feared there is a sad neglect and a 
general indifference to the whole subject. If so, nothing 
can be more fatal to the highest interests of the Christian 
religion. The Church should have a jealous care for the 
sources of its power. . . . 

" True liberalism is that which includes Christianity in 
all the length and breadth of Bible doctrine, and of a 
supernatural religious experience. The creed of modern 
liberalism either excludes Christianity altogether, or strips 
it of all supernatural authority. That creed adopted 
leaves the body of human learning a corpse, and nothing 
more. The heart and lungs of the world's thought and 
knowledge are revelation, and the faith it has inspired in 
humanity. The human mind is caged in every depart- 
ment of science and learning until the religion of Jesus 
lift the bars. Breadth of vision comes only from the 
heights of God. The horizon of law is infinitely broader 
from the summit of Sinai than from the Forum of the 
seven-hilled city. Political science runs mad, and leads 
the nations into anarchy, as soon as it leaves the council- 
chamber of God. Philosophy rings its dull changes 
through all the centuries in the narrow circles of Epicu- 
reanism, Stoicism, and Fate, until it hears the voice of 



46 MEMORIES. 

the Great Teacher. Science digs in the earth like the 
mole, or hoots from its perch like an owl in the sunlight, 
until the Master opens its blind eyes. History is a laby- 
rinth inextricable, without the golden clew of the Divine 
Word. And every branch of human knowledge has its 
only key, its richest sanction, and its proper culmination, 
in the religion of Christ. There is no breadth or pro- 
fundity of culture without it. College education must be 
inspired by it, or else be soulless and dead. The college 
life, like the individual life, should be hid with Christ in 
God." 



CHAPTER VI. 

PASTORAL WORK. — EXTRACTS FROM DIARIES. — PRAYER. — 
EXTRACT FROM SERMON. — GENERAL CONFERENCE. 

DURING the year 1867, in order to secure a preacher 
by transfer from a Western conference, there was a 
space of six months during which the clerical professors 
in college supplied the pulpit of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church in Middletown, the pastoral care meanwhile de- 
volving upon Professor Harrington. Conducting social 
meetings, caring for converts, visiting the sick and sor- 
rowing, and doing other duties incident to the position, 
gave him a love for this people that subsequent years 
served only to perpetuate and strengthen. He formed 
church classes to include all the members, and inaugu- 
rated a children's class which still continues. Besides 
the meeting of students, which he always led weekly in 
his own recitation-room, he had, during the greater part 
of the time since that year, led also one of these church 
classes, which combined to deepen his interest and anx- 
iety for the welfare of this church, until it became an 
absorbing part of his being. Oh, how, in his later years, 
he deplored her coldness, and prayed for her complete 
sanctification ! Certainly, " morning, evening, and at 
noon," he cried unto God for the salvation of His 
people. 

In no way can his own inner life, for a succession of 



48 MEMORIES. 

years, be better shown than by occasional extracts from 
his daily writings : — 

April 14, 1867. — Commenced my temporary pastor- 
ate. If it may save one soul, or make any more sure my 
own salvation, to bear this responsibility, I ought to be 
willing, yea glad, to have it. Oh that the revelations of 
eternity may show that it has secured these things, and 
abundantly more ! 

April 21. — I judge from the details of the experiences 
of others, that there is an experience in the Christian life 
which is much more desirable than any I have yet at- 
tained. Why is it? Have I idols? Have I wrong 
ideas? Do I fail even yet to apprehend Christ? Oh the 
mystery and deception of the heart ! Am I stumbling 
over the simplicity of faith? 

May 10. — To use the grace of God, is the great skill 
of the Christian. It is freely furnished on the simple 
conditions of faith and obedience, and the amount is 
proportioned to our willing use of it. We cannot expect 
to have great spiritual power unless we use the grace 
given, and apply it to an intenser Christian life. 

May 14. — In God's economy, weak things confound 
the mighty. Consecration may then be the measure of 
our strength. If we lay down our own strength, we take 
hold on Divine strength. In proportion as we truly say, 
" Not unto us," does God condescend to use our powers 
for his glory. But how to be still, and yet active, is the 
great spiritual problem. 

May 26. — Rainy and disagreeable, and I must preach 
under disappointment. But God reigns, and orders all 



MEMORIES. 49 

things ; and something good somewhere will result, if not 
to me and here. The great question is, " How shall I, 
just now, do most for God and my own soul?" Teach 
me, O Lord, and guide me, and help me by thy power. 

Sept. 7. — My mind is on the stretch for " all the ful- 
ness of God." Yesterday my heart was burdened with 
a leaden weight. This morning it does not seem so 
heavy. But I long for something that I have not, for the 
expulsion of unrest from my heart, for the clear light and 
the undoubted assurance. 

Sept. 11. — It is all of faith, through Jesus. God will 
lead the earnest, striving soul into the ability to say, " I 
am crucified with Christ ; nevertheless I live ; yet not I, 
but Christ liveth in me." And in the studies of faith he 
will every day intensify the emphasis with which the in- 
most soul shall indorse it. O Jesus, at thy feet I lie. 

Sept. 14. — God gives me a clearer view of the great 
truth that salvation in all its extent is by Jesus Christ. 
It is by his one offering that God has perfected them that 
are sanctified. Christ's holiness and righteousness and 
perfection belong to his believing children. In faith 
these are to be appropriated, and the soul cleansed. 

Oct. 1. — The first frost of the season last night. It 
was to me a wakeful night, and in my wakeful musings 
it was a time of wonderful nearness to God. Oh that I 
might ever realize, as I did then, the reality of gospel 
truth ! If I could, I could live better, preach better, and 
do much more for God. Oh, how small is my faith ! 

Oct. 3. — At thy feet, O Lord, my Saviour, I take my 
place. I am ignorant, weak, and poor ; yea, I am noth- 



50 MEMORIES. 

ing. O Lord, I am a little child ; lead me and help me. 
In the abyss of humility I cry unto thee. Save, or I 
perish. And thou wilt save. They who put their trust 
in thee shall never be confounded. O Rock of Ages, 
" let me hide myself in thee." 

Oct. 8. — Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not 
all his benefits. It seems to me that he is increasing 
my faith and confidence in him. Still I cry for more, 
wrestling with God for the gift of power, for a life that 
is hid with Christ in God, for prevailing power with God, 
for the showers of grace and the revival of his work. 

Jan. 28, 1868. — Behold God, O my soul, as a Father 
in all thy history. Let his hand lead thy every step. 
Behold him as thy Saviour and Redeemer, who hath 
loved thee with an everlasting love. Behold him as thy 
unfailing Friend, more interested in thy welfare and suc- 
cess than thou art thyself. Behold him as all purity and 
holiness ; and strive, oh, strive to be holy too. 

March 12. — "Looking unto Jesus." To keep him 
ever in mind, must be the secret of all success. To ap- 
preciate his power and willingness to help us, to feel the 
truth that all our sufficiency is in him, is truly blessed. 
When we go on in forgetfulness of him, beclouded and 
stumbling in barrenness and coldness, we are making no 
progress. O Jesus, reveal thyself unto me in loving care 
and mercy, to make me humble and holy. 

May ig. — The key to the control of the heart for God. 
Satan has false keys in abundance. He seems to have 
power to pick the most cunning lock. He has a way of 
getting in when we least expect or desire him. The best 



MEMORIES. 51 

way is, perhaps, to set one of God's good angels to keep 
guard before the door, — to keep him there by careful 
kindness and good pay, to watch against the coming of 
the adversary. 

June 9. — To live near to Christ, is the best way to 
secure immediate help when in danger through tempta- 
tion. There is a peculiar power in such nearness, to 
strengthen us against sin. How can we stumble in the 
light? How can we be deceived with the light of all 
truth revealing the hidden snare ? The sense of spiritual 
danger is keener, the warning is louder and quicker, when 
we are near to Christ. 

July 2. — Communion with God is sweet and priceless. 
For it, it is better to sacrifice all other enjoyment, if need 
be. To know the favor of God resting upon us, to enjoy 
the exalted and glorious privilege of communion with the 
highest royalty in the universe, is worthy of every effort 
to obtain. Yet only through faith and obedience can it 
come to us, without money or price. Thank God for 
any of it ! 

Nov. 6. — Can the imagination more than cover the 
facts concerning the presence of Christ? If we strive 
with the spiritual senses to see, hear, feel him, and in the 
effort are inclined to attribute all to the imagination, and 
disbelieve his presence, are we not throwing away our 
privilege in our fear of yielding to mere imagination? 
Is not the truth beyond any power of conception ? 

Nov. ig. — When simple faith is so strong that Jesus is 
a delight and a joy superior to all others, the Christian 
life is a glorious thing. We feel as if it ought to be so 



52 MEMORIES. 

oftener than it is so. Thus the perpetual struggle goes 
on. But " this is the victory that overcometh the world, 
even our faith. ,, A strange thing is faith, yet we do not 
need inspiration to prove to us how mighty it is. 

Dec. 27. — "In hope of the glory of God," I reach 
this last Sunday of the year. Full of all unworthiness, 
yet trusting in the merit, the infinite and glorious merit, 
of Christ, I still strive to do his will, and make my way to 
heaven. How much I find to lament in the year, and 
in my life, none but God knoweth. For all, I would and 
do repent and forsake, that I may find mercy. Have 
mercy, O Saviour ! 

May 23, 1870. — There is a place in the life of the 
Christian when the testimony of the Holy Spirit with 
the human spirit assures and satisfies the understanding 
of the soul's acceptance with God. This evidence is the 
peculiar possession of each one. It is the new name in 
the white stone. It is spiritually discerned. 

Jan. 5, 1869. — Term begins. Oh that I may more 
than ever rely on God for his support and direction in 
the secular duties as well as the spiritual affairs of every 
day ! Paul may plant, and Apollos water, but it is God 
who giveth the increase. The sanctions of Divine ap- 
proval are necessary to all success, and " nothing is loo 
hard for God." 

Feb. 7. — " Have faith in God." May / do this ? It is 
often a mountain barrier to faith to remember, and even 
faintly realize, the sinfulness and demerit in ourselves. 
Unworthy, unworthy, is the deep feeling, the overshadow- 
ing feeling within us, hiding all the encouragements to 



MEMORIES. 53 

believe. But He who cried on the cross, " Father, forgive 
them," can surely in his place as our Advocate pity and 
forgive, and move the Father to pardon the vilest. Oh, 
to be a bold asker at the mercy-seat ! 

Feb. 24. — Repentance is the "tear in the eye of Faith." 
Contrition of heart is the proper attitude of all towards 
God. Immersed in this atmosphere of penitence, the 
soul sees beauty in Jesus, and in all the dealings of God 
toward us. As the natural atmosphere is needful to dis- 
tribute and apply the rays of the sun to beautify and 
fructify the earth, so the atmosphere of a broken and a 
contrite heart is needful to a saving knowledge of the 
Sun of righteousness. 

March 14. — It must be a day of struggle. The vague 
yet uncomfortable and discouraging shadows of doubt 
are flitting around. The dark questionings, the spiritual 
discontent, the self-distrust and condemnation, that result 
from failures and shortcomings, — these are the hosts that 
fight me to-day. Yet in the name of Jesus Christ I will 
not give up. There is hope nowhere else. There is sal- 
vation in no other. Oh for more faith and hope and 
love ! 

May 8. — Oh for more, more, more! So says the soul 
as the thought of the possibilities of the gospel comes in, 
and the vanities of this world become more apparent. 
And so the struggle goes on. Time flies. The end has- 
tens. The garments of salvation should be as surely ours 
as the shroud of death will be ere long. How much the 
heart needs the steadying influence of grace, the ballast 
of divine thought, amid the storms and eddying currents 
that are driving us this way and that ! Oh for grace ! 



54 MEMORIES. 

May 17. — My forty-third birthday. Thanks be to God 
for the hope of spending an eternity of birthdays with my 
Lord, the blessed Jesus. Thanks be to him for the un- 
deserved mercies of these mortal years. The long-suffer- 
ing of God, how great it is ! How should my soul 
magnify the Lord ! What time he lets me live in the 
remnant of this earthly pilgrimage shall, by his grace, be 
spent in a more earnest effort to glorify him in my body 
and spirit. O Jesus ! help me. 

May 19. — These last few days have been marked by 
an especial nearness of access to God, especial sweetness 
in the communications of his grace. It is easier to real- 
ize the weakness and sinfulness of our hearts, when thus 
softened and enlightened by the Holy Spirit. Pride goes 
with darkness, and unbelief begets rebellion of spirit. 
The tenderness of heart that bows before the Lord will 
open the soul to see its entire dependence on Christ, 
and its inherent depravity. 

July 25. — At Bridgeport ; and the burden of preaching 
to a strange congregation, in a strange pulpit, is upon me. 
O Saviour ! help me to bear this burden, or rather bear it 
for me. It is thy gospel. It is thy name and thy salva- 
tion. Oh, let it be precious to me, and glorious. Let 
my own soul be filled with fatness. Let the revelations 
of eternity tell of great good done in thy name. O Holy 
Spirit, come and inspire the unworthiest of thy mortals to 
speak and think for thee. So shall God be glorified, and 
sinners be converted unto thee. 

Sept. 11. — Faith is the spiritual sense. It seems to be 
a combination of the natural senses in one. It brings to 
our spiritual apprehension the things that are unseen and 



MEMORIES. 55 

eternal. It is all eye, all ear, all touch, as the spiritual 
sense concentrates itself. But it must be exercised in 
the clear light of the understanding in order to be pleas- 
ing to God. An enlightened faith is the mighty power 
that God gives his people. It is a glorious thing to be 
able to say, " I am my Lord's, and he is mine." 

Oct. 23. — Another week gone. May the whirling 
wheels of time bring me nearer heaven as they do nearer 
the grave. Noiselessly the chariot of time moves on. 
No neighing steeds, no rushing steam, no rattling parade ; 
but drawn by the unseen forces of God, and guided by 
his hand, earth bears on her millions of passengers to the 
eternal world. No accidents, no halting for repairs, no 
slackening of speed, until the parted clouds shall reveal 
the coming Christ. 

Mr. Harrington's life was pre-eminently a life of prayer. 
That resolution recorded so early in his Christian experi- 
ence was sacredly kept. He never left his room in the 
morning, no matter how cold the air, no matter how late 
the hour, no matter what cares were awaiting, without 
first falling on his knees, and spending many minutes in 
secret communion with his God. This was followed reg- 
ularly by taking his Bible, as soon as he reached the 
parlor, and studying carefully a portion of the sacred 
book. Immediately after breakfast was our season at the 
family altar, when he armed himself anew for the day's 
warfare. We can never forget the pathos and unction 
with which he sang those morning songs of Zion, or the 
fervency of his prayers as he daily committed us all to 
the especial care of our Heavenly Father, or the look of 
trust on his face as he hurried away to morning prayers 



56 MEMORIES. 

at college chapel, a service he never lost without feeling 
really afflicted thereby. Neither were all his prayers in 
the morning; nor did the evening altar or the night 
vespers comprise them : but he understood what it meant 
to "pray without ceasing," to "pray everywhere." In a 
description of a pedestrian tour from Rome to Albano, 
he wrote : " Strolled round the lake by the upper gallery. 
Beautiful. Multo bello. It was a good place to pray 
under an evergreen oak." 

He had great confidence in the prayers of others. In 
a letter to his sister he wrote : " There is nothing more 
comforting than to know that we are resting on the 
prayers and sympathies of friends, and I believe they 
have a prevailing efficacy above." From one of his ser- 
mons we have this extract : " We may never know, this 
side of eternity, how far we are indebted to the efforts of 
others for our present gracious condition, whatever it be ; 
but, without doubt, the debt is immense. The word of 
God recognizes such efforts as an important element in 
Christian culture, both for the Church and the individual. 
'Pray for the peace of Jerusalem,' wrote the inspired 
Psalmist, centuries ago. That exhortation, heeded by 
the Church, has many a time rebuilt her ruined walls, or 
strengthened her tottering towers. The fulfilment of the 
apostle's command, ' Pray one for another,' has doubtless 
wrought, a thousand times, the establishment of the wa- 
vering, or the recovery of the erring. How touching the 
prayer of Moses for Israel, ' If thou wilt forgive their sin — 
and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book ; ' and 
who can tell its influence in averting destruction ? Was it 
not the prayer of Abraham that delivered righteous Lot 
from the fiery overthrow of Sodom ? Did not the servant 



MEMORIES. 57 

of the centurion live because of his friendly intercession ? 
and was not the ruler's daughter raised to life in answer 
to the ruler's request? These Bible illustrations are but 
the specimens of myriad instances of the results of human 
efforts in behalf of others. Eternity will make many strange 
revelations. It will be found then that national deliver- 
ance, social revolutions, and the life-career of individuals, 
have hinged upon the superhuman help which God has 
furnished just when needed, in answer to the exertions 
of others. Thousands will have to say, in the fruition of 
glory, ' By the grace of God, through a mother's prayers, 
I am what I am.' Thousands are in the midst of gracious 
surroundings, that mould their lives, all unconscious that 
they are the living stream of generations, whose silent flow 
begins far back in the springs of some pious struggle for 
the welfare of posterity. This man's missionary life-work, 
that man's career of usefulness, another's narrow escape 
from the drunkard's doom, the rescue from especial sinful 
tendencies, the opportunities for culture, the barrier that 
has changed the course of life, the ray of hope that has 
saved from despair, the cloud of adversity that has tem- 
pered the too blinding radiance of prosperity, the stroke 
of sorrow which, by the divine surgery, arrests the prog- 
ress of fatal disease, — these things, and thousands more 
that have made us what we are, we shall thankfully say 
hereafter, are the gracious fruit of superhuman help given 
through special pleas in our behalf. Everywhere the 
finger of man touches us; and, in the lifting of the cur- 
tain of divine mystery, we shall see that it is the finger of 
God." 



58 MEMORIES. 

As the years passed on, labors increased. From a 
letter written to his brother in January, 1872, is the fol- 
lowing : — 

"The work of life sometimes seems burdensome. 
Every hour is crowded with duties, until I hardly know 
which way to turn. It is a lesson which I find hard to 
learn, to let cares and responsibilities sit easy on my heart 
and mind, and so avoid the wear and tear in some degree. 
But when I can rise to the height of trying to do all 
things ' heartily as unto the Lord, and not as unto men,' 
it is easier and happier. But how hard it is, sometimes, 
to put away worldly motives and ambitions, to discard 
selfishness, and work for God and humanity ! How good 
is the Lord to bear with our infirmities and failures, and 
let us try again ! But I thank God I see a little progress, 
and find a little comfort, in the struggle to overcome the 
world, the flesh, and the Devil. 

" I am glad you enjoyed your visit with us. I feel, as 
you do, more and more enjoyment in the meeting of 
friends as I grow older, and their love is more and more 
precious to me. Life would be a dreary thing, were it 
not for some few to love us and appreciate us. The cir- 
cle must be narrow in this world, but I go for making the 
most of it. It is a little while we stay here, but we can 
use the blessings of life better as we learn their value 
more. I think we can keep each other a little nearer the 
throne of mercy than ever, when we put up our morning 
and evening and our closet prayers. It will soon be over : 
let us be faithful. " 

In the spring of 1872 Mr. Harrington was elected a 
delegate to the Methodist General Conference held in 



MEMORIES. 59 

Brooklyn. Some of the incidents and thoughts the ses- 
sion occasioned are found in his diary : — 

April jo. — To-day I start for Brooklyn. I leave my 
dear ones in the care of God. I commit my ways unto 
the Lord, and pray for wisdom and grace. In the untried 
experiences of the next few weeks I shall need to walk 
with God. May my soul come out of the trial pure ! 

May I. — The day, with its interests and responsibili- 
ties, has come. Once more I pray for grace and wisdom 
from on high. Once more I record my gratitude to God 
for mercies past. Let all my added life be the Lord's. 
Bless the dear ones at home. 

May 2. — Amid all the advantages of this contact with 
men, may I have the infinitely better one of communion 
with God. To make the most of the first, I shall need the 
second. Oh for clear and uninterrupted intercourse with 
him ! 

May ii. — The end of the week is at hand, — a week 
of interest and profit, I trust. Things do not go alto- 
gether as I desire ; but the Lord is Governor, and will 
overrule all things to his honor and glory. Oh for the 
spirit of the Master ! 

May 21. — To-day is set for the election of bishops. 
It will be very hard for all to say, " In honor preferring 
one another.'' May the Lord help me to feel so, and, 
with an eye single to his glory, to cast my vote for the men 
who are approved of God. 

The scramble of partisans is offensive. Can God over- 
rule and mercifully bring good out of evil? These elec- 
tions are probably necessary, but I do wish the worldliness 



60 MEMORIES. 

of the thing could be eliminated. Lord, help me to seek 
honor of thee. 

June 4. — The last day of General Conference. The 
instruction, the privileges, the relief from routine duties 
which it has given me, will be a grateful memory with me 
for a long time, I think. The end of all things comes. 
May I be ready for the end ! 

June 5. — Home again, thank God ! And he has blessed 
my going out and my coming in. Praise to his holy name. 
So, in resuming the labors and duties of my calling, I 
expect the rich blessing of God still. Let me trust and 
love him with all my heart. 

One morning during the session of the Conference, as 
some question of vital importance to the Church was 
being discussed, to which Mr. Harrington was listening 
with intense interest, careful not to lose one word that 
might be of advantage in forming a just opinion, a messen- 
ger called him to the lobby. There he found awaiting him 
one of the younger members of his own Conference, who 
unceremoniously commenced parading arguments upon 
the topic then under discussion, and finally said, "You 
know, brother Harrington, the views of our Conference 
in this matter, and I suppose you understand that in 
voting you are expected to carry out the wishes of your 
constituents. " Those who remember brother Harrington's 
utter contempt of every thing like political wire-working 
may easily imagine his lips growing a little thinner, his 
eye a little brighter, and his face a little paler, as he re- 
plied in measured tones, " I understand no such thing : 
I understand that I am to use my own best judgment, 
and to be governed by my own conscience ; " and turn- 



MEMORIES. 61 

ing on his heel, he hastened back to his seat on the Con- 
ference floor. 

At this conference he was made one of the Committee 
on Church Extension. He received the appointment with 
gratitude that he was permitted thus to work with the 
Church, to promote its greater power. His interest in 
that cause intensified during those four years of service, 
and continued ever afterward ; leading him, the last time 
he attended his conference at Manchester, N.H., in 1884, 
to answer one of Chaplain McCabe's irresistible appeals 
with two hundred and fifty dollars to build one of his 
" two-a-day" churches. 



CHAPTER VII. 

EUROPEAN TOUR. — LETTERS, AND EXTRACTS FROM DIARIES. 

HE was naturally fond of travel. He had an almost 
morbid love for sight-seeing. Added to these, a 
desire to gain all facilities for advantage in the work of 
his department gave him an increasing anxiety to spend 
some time in Europe, especially among old Roman scenes. 
In the spring of 1873 h e determined to devote the sum- 
mer vacation to that purpose. This necessitated separat- 
ing from his family, as the purse was too short to provide 
for three, and to leave the boy of twelve without parental 
restraint and care was a thing not to be thought of. The 
struggle this caused was repeated three days before the 
time for sailing, when the trustees kindly proposed to 
allow him one term of absence, making the "good-bys" 
to be said for six months instead of three. The offer was 
gratefully accepted ; and in company with his pastor Rev. 
J. E. Breckenridge, Prof. R. G. Hibbard of the university, 
and Rev. A. Hill of the New- York East Conference, he 
sailed from New York on June 28. The following letter 
from the home of his brother-in-law in New York shows 
his thoughts at the time : — 

"Saturday Morning, June 28, 
In Lucius's back parlor. 

" That date up there has a fruitful meaning. It compre- 
hends more than I have time or power to express. It is 
the realization of hope and the dawn of fear ; a fulfilment 



MEMORIES. 63 

and a promise ; a joy outward to which I hold my hands 
in welcome, and a grief inward from which I shrink \ a 
line of separation that cuts me in two, — or three, — and 
leaves my better parts behind ; a threshold of departure 
for scenes and experiences in themselves desired, but 
covered, as every thing earthly is, with regrets. But how 
good God is ! I don't know that I ever felt safer for you 
and myself than now. I have just read the chapter in 
John that you will read this morning, and a chapter in 
sister Loveland's book about the blessed brotherhood of 
Christ ; and I know that if we abide in him, he will abide 
in us." 

" I had a dull, sleepy ride to this city of noise and bustle. 
My head was hung on a pivot, and wabbled round 
strangely under the blind hand of Somnus. He twisted 
and turned it as he would, for all I could do. But in due 
time I arrived at this house, to find the people at tea, and 
down I went to sit at my place among them. ... I have 
not yet thought of any thing omitted in regard to matters 
at home. Act your discretion about any thing that needs 
doing about the premises that has been overlooked. Shut 
the cellar-windows when you go away. Put the padlock 
on the barn-door. Have the large gate shut and barred, 
etc., etc., etc. . . . 

"On the ' Adriatic,' in our room. Well. Lucius by 
my side. Now, good-by, and God bless you." 

July 2, he wrote from the steamship " Adriatic : " — 

" We are on the Banks. We are in a bank of fog. 
This is the fifth day out, and yet to-day, at noon, we had 
run eight hundred and ninety-two miles. All day yester- 



64 MEMORIES. 

day and all night the fog-whistle has sounded its deafen- 
ing yells every two minutes. The fog is so dense, that 
the forward watch cannot see much more than the ship's 
length. But there he stands, all day and all night, peer- 
ing out into the mist and darkness ; and ever and anon in 
the night, as the bell tolls the hour, his ' All's well ' gives 
a very cheering sense of security. The boatswain's pip- 
ing whistle calling the hands to man the ropes, the chorus 
of their voices as they sing the refrain, and pull the huge 
tackling of boom and sail, the officers pacing their beat 
on the bridge, the helmsman forever at the wheel, the 
steady rumbling of the engine that never stops to breathe 
or rest, the precision and order with which every move- 
ment goes on, — all tell of safety, and assure us that 
with the Father's good blessing we shall soon reach our 
haven. . . . 

" All day Monday, the steamer * Rhine,' that left about 
two hours before us, kept off our starboard bow in plain 
sight, neither gaining nor losing much. Since then the 
fog has hidden her. On the same day, the ' Cuba,' of 
the Cunard Line, passed us in fine style, within hailing 
distance. A sailing ship appears now and then. On this 
desert deep, it is an event to see an occasional fellow- 
traveller. The solemn voice of the ocean teaches broth- 
erhood and fellowship, and makes friends of strangers. 
It makes all who rest upon its broad catholic bosom 
forget for the time their individuality, and consent to be 
children of one household. . . . We are hardly beyond 
the influence of the land we have left yet ; and as for 
the beloved ones who tread it, we feel their influence 
some, too. We are paying out a strong cable every inch 
we make, and have no fear that storm or accident or any 



MEMORIES. 65 

thing else can interrupt the daily communication along 
the wires of the heart. . . . 

" It is getting a little monotonous. Sailing, sailing all 
the day. We promenade the long deck, gaze off into 
the fog, gather in knots and talk, go down to breakfast, 
to lunch, to dinner, read books, plan routes, try to be 
jolly, wonder who such a one is, or such a one, play 
chess now and then. Karl comes up before the mind 
with some distinctness. And thus in various ways the 
time goes on, and we wish ourselves at Cork. Shall I be 
a Paddy then, an' sure? ... It was hot enough the day 
we left port. A very dark, heavy thunder-cloud came up 
in the north, and appeared in full majesty sweeping down 
the Hudson, just as we fired our parting gun. The light- 
nings were very vivid, and the thunder rolled heavily be- 
hind us. On came the storm, as we steamed away from 
it ; down the bay and along the shores of green, past the 
harbor forts, and the forests of masts. The rain did not 
catch us, but the whole sweep of the black clouds, and the 
falling rain, and the threads of lightning, were in full view 
behind. Half a mile or more away from the Battery, with 
its little patch of green forest, flanked by an acre of bare 
masts, I saw the whole of that little area on the edge of 
the city blaze at once into sunlight. There it lay, a spot 
of brightness, that the sun through a cloud-rift had kissed 
into glory. The black thunder-head towered behind it, 
and the waves were its fringe before it. Thus the smile 
of my Father seemed to bless my going forth from native 
land, and all my heart holds dear on earth. Under that 
smile I hope to keep, and I take it as a pledge that in 
his good time I shall come again to enjoy the blessings 
of the past." 



66 MEMORIES. 

His journal during the whole of his absence was kept 
without a day's interruption, giving quite .a full account 
of all the sights and scenes, incidents and accidents, that 
filled up the days and months of absence, spiced occa- 
sionally with bits of humor, of moralizings, and heart- 
yearnings. A few extracts may give a general idea of his 
life during the time : — 

July y. — From the port window of my berth, this 
morning, my eyes opened upon the land. It was a bold, 
rocky coast, and so continues. Fastness Light lay on 
the right of our course, and Cape Clear on our left, just 
visible in the distance, as I went on deck. The wind 
was blowing a stiff breeze, and the weather was thick and 
unpleasant. But a little bright patch of sunshine glis- 
tened on the waters, as if to welcome us with a smile to 
a foreign land. I don't wonder that Columbus fell pros- 
trate upon the earth, and kissed it, when he landed after 
his perilous voyage of discovery. Any land seems good 
enough to kiss after eight days' confinement on ship- 
board. The Lord be praised ! Thanks to him who has 
saved us from the perils of the deep ! 

Aug. J. — It is a new experience to be exiled from 
home, country, and friends. I realize something of what 
it must be to be expatriated. To a warm heart, pro- 
foundly affected with the influences of domestic life, and 
depending largely upon the sympathy of loved ones for 
daily happiness, the punishment must be severe. Yet if 
country only is lost, the inscription that the regicide 
Ludlow chose and placed upon his house at Vevay, 
" Omne solum forti patria" may cheerfully and proudly 
be assumed; for with a clear conscience, and a few 



MEMORIES, 67 

hearts that love us, we can live and die contented any- 
where. The thought that exile from God and the good, 
from friends and kindred, is to be the fate of the finally 
impenitent, impresses me more than ever before. To be 
banished from the presence of God and the glory of his 
power, must be sufficiently terrible. To long for the 
loving presence and sympathy of the pure and holy, will 
be enough without the forced association of the bad. 

Father ! save me from such a doom. Help me to 
hate sin with a perfect hatred. . . . How thankful ought 

1 to be for the goodness and mercy of God to unworthy 
me ! How real is the comfort wherewith I am com- 
forted in Christ Jesus ! I will strive to dwell in the 
"secret place of the^Most High," that I may " abide 
under the shadow of the Almighty." 

Aug, 8, — Here, on the wooden step of a Swiss barn, at 
Inden, I write, while the horses eat their "sagina" bread. 
We have eaten our bread and milk and honey, and a 
good meal it was. ... It has been a climb all the way 
by the zigzag steep up from the valley of the Rhone. 
We arrived at Leuker-bad about half-past two p.m. 
Thence to Schwarenbach over the Gemmi Pass. It was 
a jaunt. But the scenery is sublime. As we at last 
emerged from the rocky depths to find " Alps on Alps 
arise " about us, and touched the path which, though 
7,553 feet above the sea, is still flanked by lofty moun- 
tains and precipices on either hand ; as we looked upon 
the mountain, lake, and glacier, and snow, — my soul went 
out in praise to Him who reared the mountains, and mag- 
nified in song the love of the glorious Redeemer. " Oh, 
for this love let rocks and hills," etc. 



68 MEMORIES. 

Aug. 10. — The twentieth anniversary of our wedding- 
day. How I would love to sit among my dear ones 
to-day in Lempster ! How has God blessed me in all 
these years of wedded life ! . . . What shall I render 
unto him for all his benefits ? " Unto thee do I commit 
my spirit, for thou hast redeemed me, Lord God of 
truth." . . . 

The Jungfrau lighted up her silver horn to-night. A 
cloud wrapped her feet, and golden sunlight played about 
her head. I thought of the Mount of God, and of the 
throne of glory on which the Judge shall sit at his sec- 
ond coming. The cloud cut it off from the earth, and 
it hung in the horizon as a huge mountain of light rest- 
ing on the unseen hand of God. 

Aug. ij. — At Lucerne, where we arrived in season 
for the last boat to Righi. Met on the wharf Rev. J. P. 
Taylor and wife. How pleasant to meet friends so ! Is 
it a type of what it will be to greet friends on the other 
shore ? 

Aug. 16. — We have left Switzerland. The beautiful 
waters of Lake Maggiore received us after a two-hours' 
ride from Bellinzona. A poor dingy boat, in ill keeping 
with the green waters and the verdant shores, became 
our conveyance to Verona. The hills and mountains 
softened and rounded their outline, and towered in a 
benign grandeur, as if a soothing hand had been laid 
upon them. Alpine ruggedness, the sharp, cold fingers 
of her needle-peaks, the glitter of her snowy horns, her 
slumbering glaciers that pillow their heads in the clouds 
and uncover their feet in the green valleys, the thunder 
of the avalanche, the roar and rush of the mountain 



MEMORIES. 69 

torrent, are all gone ; and dreamy, sunny, soft, luxuriant, 
delicate Italia is here. The ripple of green waters that 
change again to blue, the vine, the olive, the fig, that dip 
their shadows in the lake, the mountains bending their 
green brows above, the islands that float like gardens of 
Paradise, — who can help thanking Him who made the 
soul of man to be delighted with beauty, and made such 
a world of beauty to satisfy and bless the eye ? 

Aug. 17. — [In Milan.] Our morning church-going 
has been to the cathedral. No doubt curiosity was a 
large element in our motive. How far it is sinful, I do 
not know. But I try to worship among these who, many 
of them, do so sincerely. It was high mass, so they 
said. There was a procession of women, men, and boys, 
with long candles, and a canopy, and a banner, and gilded 
crosses, chanting and responding; boys swinging cen- 
sers that filled the aisles with smoke. There were bow- 
ings and genuflections, and singing and reading and 
preaching ; all alike hollow and unmeaning to me, save 
as my soul caught a little of the inspiration of praise in 
the waves of music from voice and organ, as they swelled 
among the arches and aisles and pillars of the massive 
edifice, and a little of the ardor of the preacher in his 
earnest manner, and a little of the general spirit of devo- 
tion that always pervades a worshipping assembly. 

The rich and the poor, citizen and soldier, silks and 
rags, all are here with equal rights in the most magnificent 
church edifice in the world, in common worship. Let 
Protestants learn a lesson. 

A little boy, too small to reach or even climb to the 
vessel that contained the holy water and the box for the 



70 MEMORIES. 

poor, attracted attention by his persistent endeavors to 
do both. He at last succeeded, through the kindness of 
a by-stander. All alone the little fellow struggled. How 
thoroughly the child-mind is permeated by the lessons it 
learns with eye and ear ! 

Aug. jo. — Early this morning I had my first expe- 
rience in sickness on my journey. The attack was 
severe, so much so that I was glad to send for a physi- 
cian, and had some fear that the cholera had seized me. 
To-day has been a hard day bodily, and the regret that 
my sickness interrupts brother Breckenridge's most cher- 
ished plan of seeing Rome is very great. He is very kind 
and self-sacrificing. May the Lord reward him ! 

Aug. 31. — This is one of the trial days of my journey. 
Providence seems to hedge up the way of our going to 
Rome together. The time hastens when I must pursue 
my journey entirely alone, when my company and my 
enjoyment must be confined to the novelty and interest 
of new scenes and travels. I expect hours of loneliness, 
and must, with all the joy of realizing my hopes of see- 
ing Italy and Rome, take the bitter with the sweet. I 
am under the little cloud of bodily suffering, yet strong 
is the confidence that " he that dwelleth in the secret 
place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of 
the Almighty." I shall yet praise Him who is the health 
of my countenance. 

Sept. 1. — So the hot months of July and August have 
passed away. In perils by land and sea, God has been 
with me to protect and save. Through the threatened 
illness of the last two days he has brought me, so that, in 



MEMORIES. 71 

good hope of full recovery, I set out for Milan. Thanks 
be to God and our ever-blessed Redeemer. 

Sept. 7. — Sunday in Florence. An attempt to attend 
church at the American Chapel this morning failed, there 
being no service. So the stimulus of social worship, and 
of the living voice in the utterance of religious truth, is 
wanting. Yet my heart has rejoiced in God, and felt the 
kindlings of his love. I long to know better the mean- 
ing of that saying of Christ, " If any man love me he will 
keep my words, and my Father will love him, and we 
will come and take up our abode with him." That poor, 
unworthy man should thus be the abode of God, — how 
can it be ? But, Lord, I claim the promise. O heavenly 
Guest, come in ! Thou shalt have all this tenement. 
Thou shalt command all my feeble service. The temple 
shall be purified for thee, and sanctified by thee. In 
God will I trust, and he shall be "my help and my 
shield." 

Sept. 10. — The Uffizi Gallery occupied me till two 
o'clock. I cannot pronounce upon it yet. Then the 
battistero with its brazen doors. An episode was a Cath- 
olic child-baptism by pouring. All the infants of the city 
are baptized here. Then I climbed to the cross on the 
brazen doors of the Cathedral. What a thrill came over 
me as I threw my arm about it, and thought, " I am at 
the foot of the cross " ! Lord, let me abide there. 

Sept. 11. — The Uffizi has a long throat from the Pitti 
entrance ; and its sweetness kept me a good two hours 
to-day, before I fell into the purer sweets of the " Tri- 
bunal I struggled out of this, however, and made my 
way to the Academy. How tame the modern pictures 



72 MEMORIES. 

there seem ! yet some of them are good. But the large 
room of the old masters there has gold and gems. Then 
the beautiful mazes of the Boboli Gardens swallowed 
me up, until I sighed for the clew to escape from the 
enchantment. 

Sept. 12. — . . . The Laurenziana Biblioteca interest- 
ed me much with its old manuscript copies of Virgil and 
Homer, and other ancient books of the ninth and twelfth 
centuries. How I would love to spend months in that 
library ! 

Sept. 13. — I have been half drowned, also, to-day in 
the Strozzi, Uffizi, and Pitti galleries. The creations of 
the masters in painting begin to move me. It seemed to 
me to-day, as I stood before the portraits of the painters, 
that in them I could see what their peculiar characteris- 
tics as artists would be. The delicacy and tenderness of 
Raphael's face, the intellectuality, energy, and soul in 
Leonardo de Vinci, the free, easy dignity of Rubens, are 
qualities which, I fancy, are transferred to their pictures. 
Do not a man's soul and character appear in his face ? 
So ends a most enjoyable week. And yet the treasures 
of Florentine art are only glanced at. Thanks to my 
heavenly Father for all the week has brought of mercy and 
blessing. 

Sept. 14. — I have walked and revelled to-day in the 
galleries of God. The chambers of the soul are spacious, 
and God has hung there many a portrait and many a 
glorious picture. They reveal all the phases of the soul's 
history, all the reality of its present condition, all the 
possibilities and hopes and glories of its redeemed state. 
We do not like to visit these halls. We close the shutters 



MEMORIES. 73 

and let fall the curtains, lest our eyes should fall upon 
some of these paintings. For we ourselves have been 
the artists, and the portraits and the scenes are too faith- 
ful transcripts of ourselves and of our history. We trem- 
ble lest in some spiritual parallel to Titian's Medusa with 
its writhing serpents, to Guido's Peter in tears over his 
denial of Christ, to Leonardo's Judas with his dark brow 
of treachery, to the cruel beauty of Herodias' daughter 
with the bloody head of John, to the lustful nakedness 
of Pontormo's Venus, we should see our own features of 
passion and corruption and alienation from God. 

But it need not be so. We may find ourselves min- 
gling joyously with the shepherds that have hastened to 
the manger, or with the Magi that bring precious gifts 
to the infant Christ. We may find ourselves bending in 
as rapt joy and adoration over the Babe as Correggio's 
Madonna. We may clasp the cross on which the Saviour 
hangs, with as much sorrow and devotion as Guido's or 
Perugino's Magdalen. We may gaze with as much holy 
confidence into the face of the Saviour on the judgment 
throne, as those in Raphael's painting who have just 
heard the words, " Come, ye blessed of my Father." 
And everywhere as we walk through these wonderful halls 
of the spirit, we may feel that our Companion is by our 
side ; and while we gaze with tears upon all the sinful 
transcripts of ourselves, and the pictures of our follies, he 
turns us gently to the babe of Bethlehem, the cross of 
Calvary, and the glories of Paradise. O wonderful Christ ! 
I will love thee more. Oh, let all the pictures that shall 
still be hung in the chambers of the soul breathe the 
inspiration of thy touch in every line. 



74 MEMORIES. 

Sept. 17. — (At Rome.) Here I am. A pleasant ride 
has brought me here unmarred by accident. I have 
already walked on the Corso, and listened to the band 
in the Piazza Colonna. Let me be duly thankful for all 
the mercies and favors of God. And may my stay here 
be blessed, of him in every sense. 

Sept. 20. — ... I have looked also upon the Capito- 
line Hill, and the Forum with its ruins. The first glance 
gives me the impression that it is a very small place for 
so much history, and yet that it was the focus for the 
magnificence and splendor of antiquity. What a sorrow- 
ful sight ! What a wreck the grandeur of imperial Rome 
has become ! Like the cinders and -ashes in the Etrus- 
can urns, the relics of the Eternal City are uncovered in 
all their nothingness to the gaze of the living generations, 
that go slowly past with a sigh and an exclamation, and 
think of them no more. A few trinkets and some jewels 
are found in those ancient rooms ; but they are buried in 
the ashes, or lie among the shapeless ruins. So a few 
ornaments and a few shapeless bones are all that this 
grave of the world's great mistress shows, to enable the 
looker-on to tell how noble and beautiful she was. Yet 
the mammoth scale of the relics is significant. I must 
contemplate it more. 

The Mamertine Prison I have seen too. Would that 
my eyes were keen enough to read the history on its 
walls ! What a palimpsest of stone, if all the sighs it has 
heard had registered themselves, if its tears had written 
their language, if its groans had translated themselves on 
its dark walls ! Was Paul here, and Peter? Did I look 
upon the same walls, and upon the stony pillar where 



MEMORIES. 75 

they were chained? Was I among the shades of the 
Catilinian conspirators, who suffered death here for their 
crimes? Did I hear the happy shouts of the jailers of 
the apostles, as they were baptized into the faith of the 
blessed Christ ? Did I touch the same walls that apos- 
tolic hands have touched, and, in the narrow limits of so 
sacred a prison, feel the spirit breath of those who stood 
there so long? It did not require great fancy to live for 
a few moments with the Gentile apostle. 

Sept 23. — From the campanile of the Capitol a most 
splendid view rewarded the ascent. Oh, if one could 
summon the shades of the past to move around him, and 
the crumbling structures of the centuries gone, to start 
into the splendor of their former magnificence ! But the 
Rome of to-day is a mosaic of life and death, of sepul- 
chres and monuments and ruins blending with rising 
palaces and the varied forms of busy life ; a dark picture 
of sorrow. 

Sept 28. — One misses home and the dear ones there 
more on Sunday than any other day. That is the day 
when not only the ordinary benefits and joys of home-life 
are better appreciated, but the hallowing influences of 
religion are added. A pause in the whirl and movement 
of the week makes real the difference between rest and 
motion. The tension of the domestic chords that have 
been benumbed by the excitement of business is felt 
when all is still. And then the touches of Christian faith 
and hope and love kindle new fires, and forge new 
bonds that blend with and strengthen the ties of nature. 

Rome has little of religious attraction for me. Rich as 
it is in other treasures, the treasures of art and antiquity, 



76 MEMORIES. 

it is barren enough in practical and vital religion. Foun- 
tain-head, as it claims to be, of the world's Christianity, 
and boasting of its wealth of saintly bones and holy 
relics and martyr-blood, it is a dry-spring of pure faith, 
and poor as poverty in living bone and sinew and blood. 
It is clinging to the corpse of a dead past, hovering over 
sepulchres and catacombs, climbing holy staircases, dip- 
ping holy water, kissing holy footprints and brazen toes, 
following the shadowy ghost of tradition, and ever mum- 
bling something that neither it nor the nations under- 
stand. 

Oct. 7. — The mausoleum of Hadrian. What changes 
has the dismantled old pile seen ? A tomb for the dead, 
a prison for the living, a refuge for the Popes, a fortress 
for the terror of his subjects, and now the king's. 

Oct. ij. — At Naples. In company with Dr. G. M. 
Steele, I left Rome. The route hither is along the dreary 
summits of the Apennines, and through a poor and poorly 
cultivated country, over ground full of classic and historic 
interest. Vesuvius showed itself with veiled head, as we 
approached the city, and its furrowed sides looked as 
we might expect they would after the fiery ploughshare 
has been so often driven through them. 

Oct. 14. — I have just returned from Vesuvius. At 
7.30 this morning Dr. Steele and I took a fiacre for 
Resina, the place where the ascent is commenced from 
the Naples side. The horse was largely bones, the driver 
antiquated, the cab rickety. The scenery along the street 
was an astonishing, amusing, and picturesque combination 
of ragged people ; dingy boxes and baskets ; walking 
caryatides supporting huge vessels of water or baskets of 



MEMORIES. 77 

vegetables on their heads ; sorry donkeys, the motive- 
power for big panniers that covered all but ears and tail ; 
piles of tempting grapes, pomegranates, figs, and oranges, 
big kettles of boiled walnuts, fish, johnny-cake ; go-carts 
covered with from twelve to twenty human beings, and 
drawn by one poor animal ; and a hurly-burly of craftsmen 
and tradesmen, all intent upon the business of the day. 

Dr. Steele's gray led the way, and my humble black 
followed meekly on from the station at Resina. After a 
little we came upon the lava-fields, the most noticeable 
being those of 1858, 1861, and 1872. The shapes of the 
black masses are of every fantastic variety. It was as a 
battle-field, as the folded leaves of a book, as the paws 
of lions, the backs of alligators or tortoises, as the twisted 
gnarled roots of trees, and a hundred other things. Ar- 
rived at the cone, we were beset by offers of help. But 
we meant to help ourselves. Dr. Steele, contrary to his 
usual disposition, as all his friends know, was inclined to 
be facetious at their expense ; at which I nearly lost my 
balance with laughter, and almost fell backwards down 
the steep. They finally saw the but of an American joke, 
and ceased to pester us. 

At the crater we smelt a great deal of sulphur, gathered 
specimens, thrust our sticks into the glowing lava until 
they took fire, rolled stones into the maw of the crater, 
walked round the rim, speculated upon the probabilities 
of descending inside, ate roasted eggs hot from Tartarus, 
and reflected much on the scientific questions that the 
situation suggested. The doctor was curious to know the 
effect of turning the Mississippi River into the mouth of 
the crater. The smoke, heavily charged with sulphurous 
fumes, varied, and gave us varying views. 



78 MEMORIES. 

The descent was easy, fully establishing the accuracy of 
VirgiPs statement. What it took us an hour to do in as- 
cending, the doctor accomplished in seven minutes, and 
I in a little more. Judging by the vast leaps we made, 
and admitting Darwinianism, our ancestors must have 
been kangaroos. 

The views of the wonderful Bay of Naples, and the sur- 
rounding country, are most lovely. The cities sleeping 
on the beach and in the country, the bay, Sorrento, Capri, 
Proscini, — all make the view from Vesuvius one of un- 
paralleled beauty and interest. 

Oct i8. — The Blue Grotto, on the island of Capri, is 
entirely unique. We had to get below the sides of the 
boat to enter the low aperture with safety. A strong gust 
of wind blew outward from the cave, and the waves some- 
times almost closed the entrance. Once in, every thing 
was bathed in a peculiar bluish, silvery light. It had a 
kind of phosphorescent play on the ceiling and sides of 
the cave, and gave the water a most beautiful appearance. 
The oars seemed to dip in transparent silver, and the 
body of a swimmer took the same color. The refraction 
of the light colored and permeated every thing. 

It might illustrate spiritual truth. The waters of the 
bay are just as blue outside of the grotto as within, but 
they give no color to the boats or men they bear upon 
their bosom. It is only when, through the low, narrow 
entrance, they enter into the rock, that they are covered 
and transformed by the waves that bear them, and the 
light that surrounds them. It is the same light, and they 
are the same waves ; but the general effect is not visible 
when out on the open sea, under the sky. So of Chris- 



MEMORIES. 79 

tian truth. It has no transforming power when men only 
come under its general influence. It is only when, bow- 
ing low in humble contrition, they suffer themselves to be 
carried through the narrow door into the living Rock, 
that they are bathed and permeated with the heavenly 
light. It is only while they dwell there, that they abide 
under the shadow of the Almighty. Even the shadow of 
the Almighty is light unapproachable. 

Oct. ig. — Sunday has been without the interest of 
those external helps that native land and tongue give to 
promote its legitimate enjoyment. The value of social 
worship and Christian sympathy, like all other blessings, 
is realized when we are deprived of them. ... I am 
alone with my thoughts and with my God. But the cease- 
less roar of passing vehicles, the clatter of hoofs on the 
pavements, and the general bedlam of the street, do not 
favor quiet meditation. . . . How wise the command that 
neither man nor beast should work, that the day be kept 
holy, that our thoughts should not be our own, but God's ! 
For all these are essential to man's highest welfare on the 
Lord's Day. Those who make it a day of recreation and 
pleasure, under the pretext that it is only a day of rest 
from labor, know nothing of its ultimate design to bring 
man nearer to God. To make no effort to hallow the 
sabbath, is to rob it of the marrow of its sweetness, and 
to ignore one of the wisest provisions of God to fit man 
for a holy eternity. 

The squalid, dirty poor hunt their scanty food, in their 
week-day rags or nakedness; the working classes don 
their best, and seek some form of pleasure, or lounge in 
the public square ; the wealthy expect as much of their 



80 MEMORIES. 

domestics and servants as on any other day, sleep away 
their mornings, dress in their finery for the drawing-room, 
and ride in their splendid equipages in the cool of the 
day ; tradesmen open or close their shops, as they prefer 
profit or pleasure. The Romish clergy have no higher 
idea of a holy sabbath than the formal observance of es- 
tablished ceremonials, and never rebuke the violation of 
it ; and so Naples has no real sabbath day, more than if 
the commandment had never been given. And the same 
is true of Christian Continental Europe. What a sad 
comment on the power of a catholic Christianity in the 
eighteen centuries of its history, or rather, on its false 
teaching and corrupt practices, its devitalized formality 
and soulless shell ! How sad will be the day when laxity 
of principle, and insidious excuses, and the influence of 
foreign example, shall introduce such a sabbath into 
America ! 

Oct. 26. — I wish I could conceive and realize better 
the scenes and facts of history. There must be some 
power of abstraction, — some way of transforming one's 
self into the past, — such that the words of the men who 
have spoken with wisdom and authority shall be living 
words. If I could catch the inspiration of Paul ! If 
the ages would melt away, the present vanish, the past 
emerge from the darkness and desolation and death that 
shroud it ! How I would love to stand by Paul's side, 
and look over his shoulder as he writes some of those 
words that the world calls inspired, and fathom the depths 
of his heart under the touch of the divine breath, as, mys- 
teriously impelled, he pens the immortal words ! Oh, 
how I would love to stand under the cross where Jesus 



MEMORIES. 81 

died, and catch that look, and hear those words ! How 
I wish I could stand under that cloud on the heights of 
Bethany, and see the ascending Lord ! Oh for a quick- 
ening of the eye and ear and touch of faith, since faith is 
the substance now, and has been made the evidence of 
things not seen ! 

Nov. I. — I have been taking farewell looks at the most 
interesting things in Rome. There is a sense of sadness 
in the thought, " I shall see them no more." As one 
goes to say last adieus and shake hands on parting with 
old friends, so I have done with the ruins and monuments 
of this ancient city. My route has been to S. Maria 
Maggiore, which is always new ; S. Prasseda, with its pillar 
to which Christ was fastened to be scourged, its slab for 
a couch to S. Prasseda, its blood of the martyrs, and its 
relics ; the ruins of aqueducts and water-towers, utilized 
for the most varied purposes ; the fine old ruin of Mi- 
nerva Medica, well-preserved and impressive ; S. Croce, 
with its traditional true cross of S. Helena ; S. Giovanni, 
the Pope's own ; the baptismal font of Constantine ; the 
Scala Santa, and its climbing devotees ; the Coliseum, 
grander and more impressive than any other Roman ruin ; 
the Via Appia, thence to the Forum, with all its wealth of 
memories ; the Forum, too comprehensive to be appre- 
ciated ; the Mamertine Prison, with its wonderful walls ; 
and all the atmosphere of the Capitoline, which is heavy 
with history. And now, Saturday night, I go to rest for 
the holy day. 

Nov. 16. — This morning, I went before breakfast to 
St. Michael's Church to hear the music. It was classical 
and good, as music, but as worship I did not feel in- 



82 MEMORIES, 

spired by it. There is a tendency in the concord of 
sweet sounds to inspire a spirit of worship in souls that 
love music. But mere music is hollow. One must catch 
the soul of the composer if his music have soul, and that 
must be full of worship ; or else the listener must supply 
for himself the lack, by uniting it with poetry or sentiment 
that helps to body it, so to speak, into definite spiritual 
form. I could not do that this morning, and came 
home unfed. 

I have visited the cemetery at Munich, — the old and 
the new. I noticed the graves of Frauenhofer, Gaertner, 
Schwanthaler, and some others whose names I recognized 
as eminent in the world. They lie as low as the poor 
and the unknown, and Death has passed his levelling 
hand on all alike. . . . 

There is a wreath of green and flowers on almost every 
tomb. It seems to be a German custom, thus to deck 
the graves of the dead. It is well to remember those 
that are gone, by honoring the place where they sleep : 
yet there is a higher honor and a sweeter communion 
through the channels of the memory. It requires another 
kind of effort to reach the spirits of those we have loved 
on earth ; but why should we materialize all our thoughts 
of them in marbles, or wreaths of evergreen, or scattered 
flowers, often strewn upon the dust? Why not rather 
shut ourselves in with them in the solemn stillness of the 
soul, and visit a remembered life, instead of the ashes of 
the sepulchre? 

Dec, i. — This has been a bright day of sunshine. 
The shops displayed their tempting contents as I passed, 
but I could not buy. The Tower of St. Jacques did not 



MEMORIES. 83 

pay for the ascent. The smoke had gathered, and set- 
tled over the city. A walk along the quays was aggra- 
vating, because I could not buy the books that looked 
at me so longingly. I had to put the dear beggars off, 
— hard as it was. Napoleon's tomb was the next point. 
It is probably the most exquisite and beautiful in the 
world. The hero lies no more " on a lone barren isle." 
But he lies in dust, and there is only a name left, and his 
record has gone before him to judgment. 

Dec. 16. — Blessed be God, who has brought me in 
safety to this city of Liverpool ! The day began with a 
most enjoyable breakfast with the Rev. Mr. Christopher, 
who made a fine impression on me, as a kind and godly 
man. After breakfast and a blessed season of family 
worship, he went with me an hour and a half to see Ox- 
ford. Then I took the cars for Stratford-on-Avon, did 
the house of Shakspeare, and at 4.30 p.m. took cars for 
this place, where I arrived at 9.45 p.m. Oh for grace to 
be thankful and trustful ! 

Dec. 25. — Christmas on the ocean ! How strange it 
seems ! Kindred and friends are gathered in their homes, 
and the merry voices of the loving and loved are heard 
in their mutual greeting, but I am alone on the black, 
billowy sea. Yet not alone. The Christ-child is here, 
as well as there ; and, in the Divine One, I am linked to 
many a Christian heart, and sit down at the thanksgiving 
feast that " unto us a Child is born." 

Dec. 28. — The last Sunday of the year, — and on the 
sea. How like the years of the past is this restless, 
storm-swept sea ! It heaves and swells, it rises into 
heights, and sinks into depths ; it flashes into foam, and 



?4 MEMORIES. 

lifts its solid columns ; it flings its spray aloft, and be- 
comes the chamber of the rainbow; it is a vast expanse 
of watery peaks with white summits ; it is plastic in the 
mighty hand of some unseen power to take any shape, 
and do any bidding. Such is human life ; changeful, — 
now rearing the heights of hope, now scooping out the 
valleys of despondency, passionate, calm, a waste, a 
beauty, a magnificent something in the hands of a 
mighty Power that shapes it at will. Yet oh, how good 
has that Power been in the history of my poor life ! How 
will I praise Him who has spared the unworthiest, and 
made my pathway so like the course of this noble ship, 
that right on through storm and tempest, in the darkness 
and in the light, amid all commotion and tumult, has 
obeyed the steady, silent finger that pointed to the de- 
sired haven. Oh that henceforth my life may be more 
than ever resigned to the control of Almighty wisdom and 
power ! 

Dec. ji. — What a day of rest and comfort ! What a 
complete fulfilment of desire, and answer to prayer, is 
here ! This last day of the old year is the happiest of 
them all. Home ! that word includes more than I can 
spread out on paper, or express in words. The relief 
from care and anxiety, in the forms they have taken for 
the last few months, the rest from the tossings of the land 
and sea, the embrace of human sympathy from those 
that are inexpressibly dear and precious, the wonderful 
goodness of God in sparing my own life and health and 
those of my household, the privileges of the year in their 
passing enjoyment, and in their memory now, the glad 
hopes, the heavenward desires, the boundless mercies of 



MEMORIES. 85 

my Father in countless ways, — all these are about me 
to-day, to pour peace and happiness into my heart. 
What shall I render unto God for his unspeakable gifts? 
Alas ! how poorly do I realize these things, compared with 
their value ! How weak and inadequate are my thoughts 
and feelings, as compared with the sum of my mercies ! 
Lord, I am thine, save me. To thee, all. 

The following letter was sent by the steamer " Calabria," 
on the same day on which he sailed on the " Baltic : " — 

" Liverpool, Dec. 18, 1873. 

"This is my home while in the city. I am off for a far 
dearer home at 4 p.m., by the White Star steamer t Baltic.' 
That earthly home I may never reach, and the beloved 
embraces of those dearer to me than life I may never 
realize. But our heavenly Father doeth all things well ; 
and if the joys of an unbroken household be denied us 
in the wise decrees of his will in our earthly home, the 
better, heavenly, I trust, is sure. May the last trying hour 
for each of us. whenever it comes, find us ready to depart 
and be with Christ, which, however obscure in the dim 
vision of mortal eyes, and however much the heart may 
rebel, is far better. And may the peaceful home of the 
heavenly shore where no storms arise, no ocean rolls, be 
our blissful portion forever ! " 

This letter is a good illustration of his never-failing care 
to foresee, and do all in his power to provide for, every 
possible emergency or calamity. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

CALIFORNIA. — METHODIST HYMNAL. — " ADVENTUS SECUN- 
DUS." — HYMNAL WITH TUNES. — EXTRACTS FROM SERMONS. 

IN the summer of 1875, through the kindness of his 
old-time friend Dr. L. T. Townsend of Boston Uni- 
versity, Mr. Harrington was invited with his wife to join 
an editorial party for an excursion to the Pacific. The 
two months thus spent were rich in varied enjoyment. 
Among these was the continual encounter of old school 
friends. They were among the first whom we recog- 
nized in the party on leaving New York. At Chicago we 
met the preceptress of Mount Vernon College, Iowa, 
and found in her one of the graduates at Sanbornton 
Bridge. On the platform at Omaha, Neb., the county 
judge claimed acquaintance, and proved himself an old 
Newbury student. At Oakland, Cal., the projector of the 
Pacific Railroad introduced himself, and we recognized 
another pupil from Sanbornton Bridge. And once in 
San Francisco we had in our hotel a real alumni-meet- 
ing of students of Wesleyan. 

In the three- weeks' journey across the continent, many 
expedients were devised to prevent all tediousness of 
travel. Our cars were transformed into free reading- 
rooms, social drawing-rooms, literary-club rooms, and 
Free-Mason lodge-rooms, by turns. After-dinner toasts 
and jokes were abundant, and fund of conversation of 
all kinds never wanting. 



MEMORIES. 87 

Botanical, geological, mi nera logical, and mining excur- 
sions were taken in at all points. Big cities were explored 
in Christendom, Mormondom. and heathendom * and it 
was a question whether most alarming tendencies were 
discovered in Christian cities, in Brigham Young's do- 
mains, or in the quarters of the heathen Chinee. 

Mr. Harrington entered with enthusiasm into all the 
opportunities for seeing and learning. He measured the 
biggest trees, and drank from the waters of the wildest 
cataracts. He went into the deepest mines, and scaled 
the highest mountains. He visited the opium-dens, and 
preached Christ in the Chinese missions. The cream 
of the whole enjoyment was the visit to Yosemite. Four 
days were spent in that wonderful temple of Divinity; 
and in the parlors of a hotel under the overhanging cliffs 
of mountains eleven thousand feet high, he told the old, 
old story of the cross, preaching man's redemption by 
the great God of the universe. 

In June, 1876, Professor Harrington received notice 
that he was one of the fifteen men whom the Board of 
Bishops, in accordance with a vote of the General Confer- 
ence, had appointed to revise the Methodist Hymn Book. 

He received the appointment as the greatest honor the 
Church ever had conferred upon him. 

Not until after days of prayer, and questioning of his 
fitness, did he enter tremblingly, but joyfully, upon the 
important work. As the days went on, and the labors 
increased, his enthusiasm grew intense, and absorbed 
every hour that could be spared from his regular college 
duties. The wealth of sacred song he discovered in the 
various books the committee were led to examine was 
an inheritance to his mind and soul, that blessed all his 



88 MEMORIES. 

after-life. And when the compilation was completed, it 
seemed to him that the Church had a new treasure in her 
hands, that she was very slow to appreciate. Oh, how he 
loved that Hymnal ! It was a store-house of religious 
joy to him. He wondered and grieved at the modern 
fashion of merely naming the hymn for the sabbath ser- 
vice ; he thought so much effect wa^ produced by the 
careful and thoughtful reading of those words of doctrine, 
of worship, of praise, and of holy devotion. It was to 
him a means of grace that he wished all to enjoy. Many 
an hour of sleepless night was cheered by the repetition 
of these songs of the Church. 

When the work was nearly completed, it was found a 
few more hymns were desirable to make just the com- 
plement of pages appropriated. Feeling that one sub- 
ject, which he deemed important, had not been fully 
represented, he wrote, from a heart full of fervor, the 
following : — 

ADVENTUS SECUNDUS. 

When wilt thou come, O Saviour? 

My Lord, when wilt thou come ? 
My heart is weary waiting, 

And homesick for my home. 
Each day mine eyes turn upward, 

And sweep the heavenly plain; 
For thine own angels tell me, — 

" He so shall come again." 

I tremble at thy thunders, 

That strike my startled sense, — 
The amazing conflagration, 

The melting elements. 
Yet, bold amid thy terrors, 

My joy my fears shall drown : 
I love my Lord's appearing, 

And calmly wait my crown. 



MEMORIES. 89 

Mine eyes o'erflow with weeping, 

At sight of human woe ; 
My hands hang down with fighting 

The strong and bitter foe. 
I'm waiting for the Victor, 

Whose reign is endless day; 
I'm waiting the Redeemer, 

Who wipes all tears away. 

Perhaps for me thy coming 

Will be through death's dark gate; 
I may not see thee yonder 

In clouds and royal state. 
E'en as thou wilt, Lord Jesus ! 

Thy promise is not slack ; 
From ages of death's slumber 

Thy voice shall call me back. 

Yet come, O blessed Saviour, 

Come quickly, still I pray ! 
I'm looking for and hasting 

Unto that joyful day ; 
New heavens and earth in beauty 

Shall spring at thy command ; 
And I shall see thy glory, 

And with the ransomed stand. 

After the Hymnal was completed, and it was decided 
that the hymns should be set to music, although already 
weary with the overwork of months, he earnestly coveted 
the privilege of aiding in this much more laborious task. 
The committee was smaller ; and it was practically left to 
himself and Dr. F. D. Hemenway of precious memory, 
to perform the immense amount of drudgery necessary, 
not merely to select and fit tunes to the hymns, but to fit 
them to the hymns in their already fixed order in the 
Hymnal, and under that yoke to arrange metre, style, 



90 MEMORIES. 

and melody. The time for this arduous task was limited ; 
for not only were the churches calling for the new Hymn 
Book, but the committee felt the importance of having the 
work ready for the supervision of the advisory committee, 
Professors Tourjee and Holbrook, for whose convenience 
an especial month had been appointed. This was Au- 
gust, 1877. On the 10th of that month occurred his 
" silver- wedding " day ; and, disappointed at being away 
on that anticipated anniversary, he sent home these words 
of cheer : — 

" Hail to the silver- wedding day ! The voyage of life 
has brought us to the shore of the silver sea. It has 
been a pathway of brightness and joy. We touch the 
waters of the golden sea, and launch to-day on the sec- 
ond quarter-century. How our good Father has blessed 
us ! We have little of silver and gold, but we have what 
they cannot buy. Let us love and praise the Giver of our 
joys and mercies more and more. We shall not be likely 
to see the other shore of the golden sea on earth. We 
shall celebrate our golden wedding in the city of golden 
streets, probably. Let us double our diligence to ' make 
our calling and election sure.' Great love to Karl, the 
golden bough on our life-tree. May he prove pure 
gold ! " 

But no amount of sacrifice or of labor cooled at all his 
ardor in the accomplishment of that one great desire of 
his heart, — to have ready for all our churches a book, in 
which the best sacred songs of the ages should be so 
united to music, as to promote the highest spiritual life 
and vigor. He believed music was one of God's best 
gifts to man, designed to be the agent to lift up his sin- 
degraded soul into the light and love of divine purity. 



MEMORIES. 91 

And to give music the power designed for it, he believed 
congregational singing in the churches one of the best 
methods. That the worship of God by the Church, in 
the holy songs of Zion, should affect to be accomplished 
by a paid quartet of perhaps unconsecrated voices, seemed 
to him both vain and sacrilegious. Singing and music, 
he said, could and should be as real and effective a part 
of the worship of God on every Lord's Day, as the sermon 
and prayers from the pulpit. It was that in which every 
member of the congregation should feel he had a respon- 
sibility and a share. The hope expressed in the last 
sentence of the Preface to the " Hymnal with Tunes," — 
" that the work may stimulate all the people to sing in all 
the services of the sanctuary, and may contribute some- 
what to the spirituality of divine worship through the 
power of sacred song upon the heart," — was not merely 
a written hope : it was an intense longing, and an earnest 
prayer, the answer to which he never ceased to crave 
while he lived. For the accomplishment of this desire, 
he had devoted his whole strength in utter forgetfulness 
of self, feeling it was a work to which God and the Church 
had called him \ and though the beginning of his down- 
ward course in health dated back to that over-strain of 
his energies, he never regretted that he had given to the 
work his best powers. 

The more recently issued and scholarly " Hymn Stud- 
ies," by Rev. Charles S. Nutter of the New-Hampshire 
Conference, he highly appreciated, and greatly enjoyed 
perusing, wondering if the Church generally were aware 
of its value. 

As the years of his Christian experience increased, his 
devotion increased for the cross of Christ. Faith in the 



92 MEMORIES. 

atonement was the zenith of his creed. He often won- 
dered that that central doctrine was not oftener made 
the theme of pulpit-teaching. During his last sickness, 
he always listened with great interest to any one who 
would report to him a sermon they had heard ; and often 
afterward would say, " Yes, that is all good ; but I long 
to hear more about Jesus and the cross, Jesus and the 
resurrection. Oh, how I wish I could preach ! " he fre- 
quently exclaimed. " It seems to me I could make the 
people see, as I never could before, that it is Jesus* 
blood that saves from sin." 

In one of his sermons he wrote : " In the death of 
Christ for the sins of mankind, we have the grand culmi- 
nation of the original decree, the realization of all types 
and shadows, the literal sacrifice of the Lamb slain from 
the foundation of the world. 

"The decree of God is unmistakable. Whatever be 
the cavils and objections, the difficulties and mysteries, 
the word is plain and sure : ' Without shedding of blood 
is no remission. ' Christ's words to his disciples are : 
' This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed 
for many.' i In whom we have redemption through his 
blood,' says Paul to the Ephesians, ' the forgiveness of 
sins, according to the riches of his grace.' And again, 
to the Colossians, ' Having made peace through the blood 
of his cross, it pleased the Father by him to reconcile 
all things unto himself.' John's testimony is, ' If we walk 
in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one 
with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son 
cleanseth us from all sin.' 

" All complaint against this decree is forestalled and for- 
ever silenced by the provision of God, made and executed 



MEMORIES. 93 

for its fulfilment. He who established the necessity has 
himself met it. What matters it how hard the conditions 
of his justice, if they are balanced by his mercy? How 
could we censure a judge for the severity of his sentence 
if he at once voluntarily assumed the criminal's place, and 
suffered in his stead ? How could we find fault with a 
sovereign for making any law whose penalty he suffers 
himself that his offending subjects may not suffer? If 
man had been remedilessly left to bear the penalty of his 
own sins with his own blood, wonder at such a merciless 
severity might have begotten desperation and sullen defi- 
ance. If heartless and implacable Fate had driven its iron 
chariot-wheels over bleeding humanity, humanity might 
well have cursed the gory monster with its dying breath. 
If godless law, as some, in these days of advanced thought, 
will have it, has developed the human race for self-butch- 
ery during its earthly career, and painful extinction at 
last, the race might be pardoned for vainly raging at such 
a shedding of blood without remission. The mystery 
and terror that cover mere law and blind fate are a thou- 
sand-fold greater than attach to the sovereignty of an 
all-wise God. 

" Let the earth rejoice in the reign of a just God. Let 
the earth doubly rejoice in the reign of a God of mercy. 
If blood must atone, the blood of atonement is at hand. 

" By such a provision, moreover, the wisdom and right- 
eousness of God are vindicated. The decree that ordains 
the remission of sin by the shedding of blood, was made 
in full view of the Divine method and purpose to fulfil 
it. It could not have been any thing short of necessity, 
governed by infinite wisdom and righteousness, that 
issued a decree which must cost the blood of the Son of 



94 MEMORIES. 

God. It was no slight demand that could coolly ordain 
the suffering of the Creator in the creature's stead. In 
the clear light of the incarnation, with all it involved of 
humility and shame, beholding the bloody sweat of Geth- 
semane and the wounds of Calvary, realizing the agony 
of the hiding of the Father's face, and the darkness of 
the sepulchre, He who was to endure it all pronounced 
the word, ' without the shedding of blood is no remis- 
sion.' If a milder penalty for sin could have been de- 
vised, if less than death were possible for crime that 
would rob God of his throne, would he have ordained it ? 
Would he have made it mean more than needful to be 
' despised and rejected of men,' to be ' a man of sorrows 
and acquainted with grief? Was it a needless work, that 
he was ' wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for 
our iniquities ' ? Did he submit to torture without a 
cause ? 

"Without his sacrifice, the world might have paused 
and questioned. Isaac's wondering query on Mount 
Moriah, 6 Where is the lamb for the burnt offering?' 
would have been the unanswered cry of the ages, as gen- 
eration after generation paid its own penalty of blood. 
Abraham's unwavering reply, ' God will provide himself 
a lamb,' was faith's all-satisfying answer, prophetic then, 
but now forevermore accomplished. The Old-Testament 
text, ' Thou shalt surely die,' finds its ample explanation 
in the Revelator's comment, 'the Lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world.' 

" The mystery of sin and death is solved by the greater 
mystery of redemption. As two hard, dark substances 
sometimes flash into flame when brought into contact, 
so, from spiritual affinities, two eternal mysteries, brought 



MEMORIES. 95 

into contact with each other, evolve the glorious light 
that floods the world with mercy, salvation, and love." 

It was not in his sermons alone that the wonderful 
plan of redemption was mentioned. It was an ever- 
present thought with him, interwoven in his every-day 
life. In one of his familiar letters to a sister, he says, 
" How in the world I succeed in keeping up my end of 
the yoke in the matter of letter-writing to your family, is 
a marvel to me. Why, there are six of you against one ! 
Wonder how many I owe now ? Well, never mind : if 
I get hopelessly in debt, I expect you will forgive the 
debt. That is the only way I can get square in many 
of my failures in this world. And I am more and more 
thankful that our good Father can do the same for all 
the follies of life. I do not understand the great mystery 
of pardon through a Saviour ; but it is that or nothing for 
my poor soul, and there I hang my hope. That hope 
ought to grow brighter and sweeter every day, for the 
days are flying. But so stupendous a mercy, and so infi- 
nite a work wrought for only dust and ashes, defiled at 
that, sometimes staggers me. I mean, however, that 
death shall find me under the light of the cross, behold- 
ing the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the 
world." 

In an address delivered on the death of President 
Garfield, he says, " The life of our redeeming Lord was 
the sum of all perfection, and his example worthy the 
imitation of the race. But his sufferings and death were 
their salvation. It is the cross of Christ in which all his 
disciples glory. It was ordained that even the Son of 
man should be made perfect through suffering. Men 



96 MEMORIES. 

admire and honor his stainless character, his self-denying 
poverty, his ever-active benevolence, and the divine wis- 
dom of his words ; but it is at the foot of the cross that 
they sit in wondering love, and reverent, tearful worship. 
And in the worship of heaven, according to the record 
of Revelation, the song is, ( Worthy is the Lamb that was 
slain, to receive power and riches and wisdom and 
strength and honor and glory and blessing.' " 

In all his later sermons, it was his constant, earnest, 
longing effort to show clearly the simple faith of Jesus ; 
to teach what is meant by evangelical conversion ; and 
to convince all, if possible, that this old gospel truth is 
still the truth of God. From a sermon on i Cor. ii. 14, 
is taken the following extract : — 

" When through the study of the divine history, which 
is the simple revelation of God's love to man in the gift 
of his Son for the sin of the world, and which, stripped of 
all abstraction and imagination, is the essence of the gos- 
pel, — when, through the study of this, God's Spirit be- 
gets a gospel-faith in the heart, then the one knowledge 
which science can never give by gradual processes enters 
the soul. It is the knowledge of Christ as a personal 
Redeemer : as real and tangible as any other truth. 
That there is such a knowledge, a distinct and separate 
fact, as real and cognizable as any other fact, is the foun- 
dation rock on which the whole fabric of salvation is 
built. It is the first item of the things of the Spirit of 
God, which the faith-faculty reveals, and is the key to all 
the rest. He who denies that conversion is a real change, 
having definite characteristics and appreciable evidences 
— that regeneration is not a shadowy dream, nor a fig- 



MEMORIES. 97 

ment of the imagination, but a matter of personal con- 
sciousness and knowledge, denies the accumulated testi- 
mony of unnumbered multitudes all along the line of 
Christian history, and the express declaration of the 
Divine Word, which is the authority for the whole plan 
of salvation. With this doctrine Christianity stands or 
falls. When this is surrendered, the citadel is surren- 
dered. It is the sole distinction between Christianity 
and heathenism. It is the belief of the soundest divines, 
that the whole Christian Church in the first centuries 
enjoyed it, and that all the reformed churches in Europe 
once believed it. Luther, Calvin, Melanchthon, Armin- 
ius, Wesley, insisted upon it. Says Sherlock, 'I desire 
those who think they have no need to trouble their heads 
about conversion by faith in Jesus Christ, to consider the 
character of Cornelius. He was devout, and feared God 
with all his house ; gave much alms to the people, 
prayed to God always : and yet there needed to be a 
vision to Cornelius, another to Peter, preaching by Peter, 
the descent of the Holy Ghost, and baptism, to make 
Cornelius a Christian.' Inspiration says, ' Hereby we 
know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath 
given us.' When, by receiving Christ, power is given to 
become the sons of God, when peace is given for turmoil 
and unrest, when a heart of flesh replaces a stony heart, 
when, in a new creation, old things pass away, and all 
things become new, — certainly, changes are wrought as 
definite and real as the transition from sickness to health, 
or from dungeon darkness to the broadest sunlight. If 
there is any direct or explicit language in the Scriptures, 
it is that which describes this change." Farther on, he 
says, " Conversion is a simple, round fact, uncombined, 



98 MEMORIES. 

uncompounded, unamalgamated, of which men have 
knowledge by faith." 

From the last sermon he wrote, on Phil. iii. 9, are 
taken the following extracts : — - 

"What is the faith that makes men righteous? 

" Negatively, it is the faith that cuts loose from every 
object save Jesus Christ. It has no collateral reliance. 
It does not prop itself up by braces that reach away to 
various foundations. It does not fortify itself by Quaker 
guns, nor kindle false fires of strategy. It has no tempo- 
rary defences, where it may hide and skirmish, away from 
its stronghold and impregnable last resort. It does not 
scout curiously or wantonly into the regions of imagina- 
tion or reason, to toy and dally with uncertainties and 
possibilities, and the dangerous snares of its enemies. It 
borrows no support from material nature, or the nature of 
man, or the nature of God. It does not strengthen itself 
by appealing, as grounds for consideration, to the eternal 
harmonies, to hereditary fatalistic bias, to circumstantial 
hinderances, to the mysteries of human history and 
human destiny, or to the attributes of the Divine charac- 
ter. It does not allege a moral life, a hard lot, an unbe- 
lieving tendency, an amiable or benevolent disposition, 
as virtual objects of faith, in that they partially or entirely 
excuse the imperfection or absence of faith in the only 
proper object of it. It does not substitute the life of 
Christ, his spotless character, or his marvellous teachings, 
for the cross of Christ, the essential, central object of 
faith. 

"It is a faith that utterly renounces all dependence 
upon ourselves. It recognizes without qualification our 



MEMORIES. 99 

lost, undone, helpless condition. For, otherwise, we 
should claim to be partners with God in the redemp- 
tion of the soul. Christ would not be the Saviour of 
men, but only an assistant in their moral improvement. 
He could not be the giver of life, unless men were dead. 
Salvation is a misnomer for the gospel scheme, unless 
sinners are hopeless. 

" It is a faith that recognizes the depravity of our 
nature, our actual guilt, and the justice of God in his 
judgment of sin. It confesses squarely and honestly our 
ill-desert, and the righteousness of God in the execution 
of the penalties he has denounced against the sinner. 
To do less than this, would be to charge God with over- 
estimating our guilt, and making a superfluous or unne- 
cessary provision against an unreal danger, and demand- 
ing more than our need warrants. 

" The faith that makes men righteous is the faith that 
fastens simply and trustingly on the Lord Jesus Christ as 
the only, all-sufficient, atoning Saviour. To that faith it 
is Jesus that blots our transgressions, makes our record 
clear. It is Jesus that gives spiritual life. It is he that 
continues it. This faith merges the believer's life in the 
life of Christ. It dares not, it wishes not, a moment's 
separation. It knows no historic past; it deals only in 
present tenses. It echoes Paul's prayer, ' Let me be 
found in him? It sees that to be found there is to be 
a partaker of the divine nature. As a polluted drop of 
water loses its filth in the ocean, so it sees the soul's un- 
righteousness disappear in the infinite righteousness of 
Christ ; and, as the drop is kept pure in the bosom of the 
sea, so is the soul kept pure in the embrace of infinite 
purity. It is in Jesus that the soul finds holy living, con- 



IOO MEMORIES. 

stant victory over self and sin, the world, the flesh, and 
the Devil. . . . 

" The wondering question, { How can these things be ? ' 
begins with Nicodemus, and ends with Thomas, in the 
gospel history. Neither the master in Israel with all his 
learning, nor the disciple of Jesus under the living voice 
of the great Teacher, has explained it to the understand- 
ing. Apostolic wisdom has only set forth the facts and 
results of a spiritual experience, and left its philosophy 
unrevealed. 

" It is the riddle of the ages. Millions have fallen upon 
this stone, and been broken \ on millions it has fallen, and 
ground them to powder. No answer has ever been heard 
but the answer of the believing heart. It has contained 
no explanation of processes. It has only been a living 
witness of the fact. Somehow, in all generations, when 
the ringer of faith has touched the Saviour's garment, and 
the voice of faith has said, ' My Lord and my God/ the 
marvellous change has been wrought, and the sinner, in 
the filthy rags of his own righteousness, has become 
clothed in the royal robes of Christ's righteousness. He 
may not be wise enough to explain the philosophy or the 
method ; but he is a witness to the great work, and his 
whole soul adopts Jude's inspired language, ' Now unto 
Him that is able to present me faultless before the pres- 
ence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God 
our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, 
both now and ever.' 

" It would seem strange, to one utterly unacquainted 
with the conditions behind it, that the poorest man on 
earth, by presenting a bit of paper at the counter of a 
banking-house, indorsed by the single name of one of 



MEMORIES. IOI 

our countrymen, might instantly become possessed of mil- 
lions, not by any thing that he had done, or could do, but 
solely by the virtue of that name. But it only dimly shad- 
ows forth the power of that Name by which the poorest 
sinner of us all may be made, in a moment, richer than all 
earth's riches. It is gloriously true, and we can have some 
conception of it, that the humblest citizen can wrap him- 
self in the stars and stripes, and traverse the globe, stand 
in the presence of kings and emperors, face all the power 
of arms and laws, and everywhere command respect, and 
everywhere defy harm or injustice. It is not in him, but 
the flag of his country robes him in the strength of a 
mighty nation. But it faintly illustrates how the humblest 
saint, clothed in the robe of Christ's righteousness, may 
stand fearless before principalities and powers, and the 
rulers of the darkness of this world, and even the arch- 
enemy of souls, and defy his power to harm or do him 
wrong. He wears the royal garment of Him who can be 
just, and the justifier of him who believeth in Jesus. 

" I cannot tell the process. I cannot explain the power 
by which the black coal is transformed into the gleaming 
diamond : how much less can I tell how, by the mystery 
of the new birth, the lost, dead soul lives by the merit of 
Jesus ! I cannot tell how the living tree gets its flower 
and fruit from the dead substance in which it is rooted, 
and on which it feeds : how much less can I tell how the 
wounds, the blood, the death of Christ, give life to 
the soul dead in trespasses and sins, and clothe it with 
the fruitage of holiness ! Or how can I tell the end of 
this divine work, when the Giver of spiritual life shall crown 
it with life eternal ; when dust and ashes — this body — 
shall spring from its sepulchre, and appear in the glori- 



102 MEMORIES, 

fied body of the resurrection? But it shall be done, ac- 
cording to the working of the power whereby he is able 
to subdue all things unto himself. Enough for me that 
this is God's way, and the work is worthy of God. The 
righteousness may be mine by the faith of Jesus Christ. 
' Not by works of righteousness that we have done, but 
according to his mercy, he saved us by the washing of 
regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost.' 
Faithful is he that hath promised, who also will do it." 



CHAPTER IX. 

KARL. — BIRTHDAY POEM. — LETTERS. —DIARIES. — CLASS-MEET- 
INGS. — SICKNESS. — VACATION. — LETTERS. — NEW-HAMP- 
SHIRE CONFERENCE. 

IN the year 1882 occurred his only boy's graduation 
from college. He had watched the four years' course 
with the intensity of interest that only a Christian parent 
can know. He understood so well the snares, the pitfalls, 
the lions in the way. His constant prayer was that his 
boy might pass through this test period with body unim- 
paired, with mind well stored and disciplined, and with 
soul unscathed. He had consecrated him to God at his 
birth. April 4, 1869, his diary reads, "To-day our dear 
boy wishes and intends to go forward in the sacrament 
of baptism. He is a child, and has the light-heartedness 
and impulsiveness of a child ; but I think he has also a 
childlike faith in Jesus as his Saviour. Doubtless he has 
not the deep and clear comprehension of the meaning of 
the rite, that adult years will bring \ but that is no reason 
why he should wait for the years to come before he de- 
votes his young heart to Jesus. Oh that God may receive 
him and bless him ! " A year later, on the day of his 
joining the Methodist Episcopal Church, in full member- 
ship, a note of the fact is closed with, " Oh that in the 
Church militant he may war a good warfare, and win a 
glorious crown ! " June 13, of 1882, completed Karl's 



104 MEMORIES. 

twenty-first year; and his father's birthday gift was ac- 
companied with an expression of his thoughts at that 
time : — 

" O childhood, boyhood, youth, thy years, — 

Prelude and pledge of manhood's prime, — 
With all their joys and hopes and fears, 

Are garnered with the sheaves of Time. 
With hurrying footsteps, one by one, 

Ye trooped behind the restless Now, 
That double veil of night and sun, 

Which flings its gloom o'er the cold brow 
Of lifeless years ; but flames its beams 

Of buoyant hope on Time's last-born, 
As if that would not swell the stream 

Gone by, or night not follow morn. 
And darker through the fourscore sum 

On life's first stage the pall shall rest, 
As echoes faint and fainter come, 

Repeated from each mountain breast. 
Yet, O young years, a score and one, 

An immortality is yours ! 
Essential life, now just begun, 

Unending while the soul endures. 
Only the gross and mortal clay 

Is sepulchred behind the veil ; 
The soul of Time must ever stay 

To set its seal, and tell its tale. 
As diamonds gleaned from worthless sand, 

Or golden grains in torrent-bed, 
So may these years, with liberal hand, 

Leave only blessings on thy head. 
And if God give thee length of days, 

And fill them with a gracious store, 
Be all thy years his psalm of praise 

Thy benediction evermore." 

June 29 the diary says, " It is the commencement day 
of life with us, in that Karl is to graduate. How inde- 



MEMORIES. 105 

scribable are the emotions that run along the nerve-track, 
and thrill the hearts of fathers and mothers to-day ! " 

Jwie 30. — The show is over. With thanksgiving to 
God, be it recorded that mercy and goodness have been 
abundantly shown to us and ours in all the anxieties and 
labors of these days. The Lord is good. 

Aug. 4, he wrote to his sister : — 

" Lizzie invites me to increase the bulk of her letter 
to the extent of half a sheet. Probably she has told you 
all the news about the condition of the household, both. 
as to the pleasure of the past and the contrast of the 
present. The pleasure of the past has been heightened 
not a little by the presence of Mary. And now that she 
and Karl have disappeared, the desolation is quite con- 
siderable. So we are solacing ourselves as well as we 
can by keeping busy, and writing letters to our friends 
for an episode in our regular work. Sometimes I wish I 
had more friends, so that I might enjoy the pleasure of 
more visits ; and sometimes I wish that I had none, so 
that I might be spared the pain of parting from them. 
But the mixture of pain and pleasure, good and evil, in 
all things earthly, is God's law, ordained, no doubt, in 
wisdom for the welfare of his creatures. The 'what 
for ' is none of our business, if the fact be so. The 
sooner we can come to the point of accepting the situa- 
tion, of eating from this table of the Divine spreading, 
'asking no questions for conscience' sake,' or any 
other sake, the better it will be for our peace. It is 
always ' hard to kick against the pricks.' The lesson is 
plain ; but, oh, what slow learners we are ! 

" My time, these days, is variously divided between 



106 MEMORIES. 

house, dooryard, and college, with suitable episodes down- 
town and to the religious services ; all of which divisions 
are, doubtless, of no importance to you. Sometimes life 
seems bright, and sometimes dark, which is a common 
experience, and no news. Yet all these little insignifi- 
cances have their meaning and bearing on others 7 lives, 
else I should not be writing this little nothing to you. 
How strange that each other's littles make up so large a 
part of each other's whole ! Every thing is strange in 
this world. Nothing is strange in this world. Isn't this 
a moralizing, paradoxical letter? " 

Aug. 1 8, he wrote the following to a niece : — 

" We are Block-Islanders, you see. No connection 
with the Wook.-head family. It is only a temporary expe- 
dient to escape the heat of home for a few days, and try 
what effect the change of air may have on our heads and 
nerves. If it makes our heads wiser, and our nerves 
stronger, it will pay. . . . We had a fine sail hither, and 
it is as cool and beautiful this afternoon as one could 
wish. 

I've just been down by the sounding sea, 

And watched the waves come in ; 
And they murmured their sea-song tenderly, 

As if they'd a soul within ; 
And the rocks on the shore stood white and bare 

Save their tresses of seaweed green, 
And the ripples toyed with their tresses fair 

As the tide rose and sunk again ; 
And the heaving waves caught my thoughts away 

From the pebbly sea-washed strand, 
And wafted them over the watery spray 

To the friends of a far-off land. 



MEMORIES, 107 

" That is all the rhyming I can afford to do to-night 
But I wish you could enjoy the sea view from our Spring 
House veranda, as it stretches away, and spreads to the 
right and left, and loses our gaze at last in the far east, 
where the clear sun-line cuts the sky. It is beautiful, 
and the air is cool ; and there is blue above, and blue 
beneath. The young moon is in the west, and the stars 
crop out one by one, — the thoughtful, faith-inspiring 
stars of God. Nature is full of good suggestions, but the 
buzz of conversation around us is little in harmony with 
it. I wonder if Nature and human society are often in 
harmony. Things seem sadly out of joint sometimes, 
but I guess it is due to the perversity of poor human 
nature chiefly. . . . 

" I do hope the purpose you formed that Sunday even- 
ing will prove a point of departure for a decided up- 
grade, and a richer experience. Strike out into deeper 
water, and trust the Lord to help you swim, and perhaps 
even to walk on the water, by his mighty help. Forget 
self, and go out after somebody who shall be a star in 
the crown of your rejoicing." 

On the morning of April 13, of this year, he had been 
seized with a sudden and very severe chill, that was fol- 
lowed by a fever, which kept him from his work for three 
weeks. And though he seemed to recover fully from it, 
and during the year to be as vigorous as usual, yet he 
said himself afterward, " I think my health was breaking 
in the summer of 1882. I am sure I was not myself 
then, either physically or mentally. In no other way can 
I account for certain experiences at that time." 



108 MEMORIES. 

Jan. i, 1883, his diary says: " The transition to the 
new year makes no jostle of earthly conditions. The 
swing of the planet is peaceful and steady. Hope is still 
the star in the east. Purpose still clings to the word of 
God, and to the Saviour of men." 

Jan. 28. — My day in college chapel. I go to the 
duty with some different feelings from those I had at one 
time. I would use the opportunity to deliver God's mes- 
sage to man in a way that shall please him. The ranks 
of Satan's army are full, and their vast numbers make 
their very inertia immense in power. There is no hope 
save in God, who can make " one to chase a thousand, 
and two put ten thousand to flight." 

Feb. 10. — We had a good meeting last night. Its 
feature was the evident presence of the Holy Spirit in 
unusual power. Thank God ! Oh that he would stir this 
wicked place to its foundations ! Lord, awaken sinners. 

This refers to one of the meetings of his church-class, 
held on Friday night. That class was his Bethel. He 
went to it weekly with the anticipation of a child to his 
home ; and he left it with the refreshing of soul that 
came from having met his Lord. He often wondered 
how any one who knew what communion of saints meant, 
or who had any sense of being lifted up by the power of 
united faith into the presence of Jesus, could deny him- 
self the privilege of attending a weekly religious class- 
meeting. " I cannot understand it," he would say. " I 
don't believe they are aware of the wonderful power of 
Christian communion." How often he urged upon young 
Christians the importance of improving this means of 
grace in our church ! And to students, who sometimes 



MEMORIES. 109 

pleaded want of time, he frequently quoted the example 
of an associate professor, who had evidently lost no power 
as a scholar, though during the four years of his college 
course he was scarcely once missed from this weekly 
meeting. 

During the spring vacation, a cold and fever kept him 
in bed for five days. On the day of opening the term, 
he wrote : " My strength is not up to the normal, but I 
guess I am strong enough to begin. Give me, O Lord, 
a thankful heart for all I have, and grace to do all thy 
will in future. Especially keep me from besetting sin." 

June 1. — The beauty of the day is a promise for the 
month. It will be one of trial and hard work. It will 
need patience and self-control. I pray for help. With 
all the conviction that to die is to live, it is hard work to 
do it. 

But the "trial and hard work " were of a different na- 
ture from what he expected. That night he came home 
severely chilled, and before morning was in a burning 
fever, that kept him in bed during the whole month, and 
in extreme suffering. Every effort to conquer the disease 
seemed unavailing. Day by day suffering increased and 
strength decreased, and night after night hope grew less ; 
until, one midnight hour, he thought his work was done, 
and he must make ready to go. Having expressed his 
wishes as far as possible, with trembling voice he sang, — 

" Abide with me ! fast falls the eventide, 
The darkness deepens : Lord, with me abide. 
When other helpers fail, and comforts flee, 
Help of the helpless ! oh, abide with me." 



HO MEMORIES. 

The Helper came, and disease yielded slowly to medi- 
cal treatment. During the month of July he began to 
move about his room, and finally gained strength to join 
the family circle. One morning, after a bath, he sud- 
denly discovered that there was no apparent action in his 
right lung. His physician was called to examine it, who 
at once acknowledged the fact, and gave little hope that 
the organ would ever regain its use ; though, he said, 
many years of life and labor might continue without it. 
This was a terrible trial. "To make up one's mind," 
he said, "that life henceforth is to be the life of an 
invalid, a life of endurance, of crippled powers, unfit to 
battle in the conflicts of strong men, is exceedingly 
humiliating, and requires great store of grace." 

July 2 7 he wrote the following, in a letter to a niece : 
" I find, in looking over my unanswered letters, that your 
last one is among the number. It was dated two days 
before I was taken sick. . . . 

" Since then I have been nearer than ever before, so 
far as I know, to the great divide that separates the con- 
tinents of life and death. One looks both ways in such a 
case, and while the eye lingers on the familiar scenes and 
faces of the sense-world, it also throws many glances at 
the world unseen. The nearer view intensifies the inter- 
est in the unexplored unknown, and begets heart-search- 
ing in the depths where the soul's secrets and its real 
condition have never been so fully realized before. So I 
hope the discipline of sickness will make me a better man, 
and more fit for heaven by and by." 

The first week in August, with his family, he took the 
little voyage from New York to Portland. He loved the 



MEMORIES. ill 

sea, and all the effect of the voyage acted like a charm 
upon his strength. Encouraged by this, we went to Old 
Orchard, and spent two weeks looking for a continuance 
of improvement. He hoped much from sea-bathing, in 
which he had formerly revelled. Once, for a moment, he 
tried its effect here, but only to be convinced he could 
not endure it. The heat was oppressive, and he lost the 
good gained on the voyage. 

Thence we went to the summit of Mount Pleasant, 
in Bridgeton, Me., and spent about ten days. These were 
days of great encouragement. The air was health and 
strength. The place was quiet and delightful. The guests 
were intelligent and social. We strolled over the moun- 
tain wilds, sat on the rocks and read in the sunlight, and 
never tired of gazing at the grand array of White Moun- 
tains that stretched all along the horizon, on the one 
hand, or the varied summer scenery that lay, a bright 
parorama, on the other. Oar time there was all too short ; 
but the end of summer vacation drew near, and no argu- 
ments could induce him to be away from his classes at 
the beginning of the college year. He returned to his 
post of duty, and persistently, throughout the year, prose- 
cuted his usual work, though contending constantly with 
physical weakness, and more or less pain. Changes in 
the weather were keenly felt ; and other annoyances, that 
formerly he met with cheerful courage, were heavy bur- 
dens. This physical suffering affected his spiritual life, 
so that the year was one of conflict, without the usual 
victories. 

Jan. 28, 1884, he wrote : — • 

" ' Fight on, my soul, till death, 
Nor lay thine armor down.' 



112 MEMORIES. 

"Since that is God's will, it is best not to murmur, I 
suppose, but try to keep step to the battle-march." 

Jan. jo. — " ' These all died in faith.' The best men 
of whom we have any record have gone down with no 
other light. Let us not, then, complain, but accept the 
doctrine as cheerfully as possible." 

The following letter to his sister was written on Feb. 
6: — 

"It rains outside, and so I am cheated out of my 
prayer-meeting. I'll have a quiet chat with you, then, 
instead, and pay my debt. . . . 

"I am glad the world has some good people in it. 
Sometimes I think they are very few, — only just enough 
to save it from another rain of fire and brimstone. This 
is in my pessimistic moments, when the rascality of rum- 
sellers, the greed of politicians, or the lying tricks of 
all sorts of selfish people, absorb my thoughts. At other 
times, I am ready to admit that there are a great many 
people who are a great deal better than they seem to be, 
and perhaps thousands on thousands who are the Lord's 
freemen, though they seem to be Satan's slaves. This 
is when my charity is in full bloom, and my estimate of 
myself is far below zero. Which is the better view to 
take, the nearest correct in point of fact, and the most 
beneficial to us? Don't you ever catch yourself saying 
to yourself, ' Well, if I can be saved, then nobody need 
despair;' ' If so poor a Christian as I can be counted 
one of God's children, then anybody can ' ? Maybe you 
don't ; but I have occasional musings of that sort, and 
don't feel like judging the meanest creature on earth. 
Do you ever wonder how, in even the infinite power and 



MEMORIES. 113 

mercy of God, he can make our vile human nature fit 
for a holy heaven and the holy fellowship of Christ and 
his saints ? It seems to me one of the greatest mysteries 
of the plan of salvation. But then, of what use to dwell 
on the mysteries of our faith ? The only way to get even 
a crumb of comfort out of the plan of salvation is to 
make faith the single, central, sole personal fact with our- 
selves. Naked faith is the only reliance. We must per- 
suade ourselves that it has ample foundation, and exercise 
it. Let every thing else go. Shut eyes and ears and all 
the senses to all the clamors of world, flesh, and Devil, 
and be everlastingly content to be called fools, for Christ's 
sake. I don't see that any harm can come of it. We 
shall be as well off as those other fools who call us so. 
They tread round in their little half-bushel of reason and 
doubt and speculation, and never know any thing after 
all. And the grave will soon end all, and test all. ' Let 
me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end 
be like his.' " 

The diary of March 14 has : "What can be more de- 
sirable for a human being, fully aware of the conditions 
of that being, than to have a clear, unwavering faith in 
the great doctrines of God, heaven, and immortality? 
' Lord, increase my faith.' The unbelief of our hearts is 
amazing. The key to our indifference, our worldliness, 
and our sinfulness, in many ways, is a practical unbelief 
in what we profess to believe. We need to cultivate our 
faith greatly." 

March 5 he wrote again : — 

" Probably the chief interest you will take in this letter 
will be the consciousness that somebody, away off in the 



114 MEMORIES. 

State of Connecticut, has remembered a debt, and pro- 
ceeds to pay it. As to the matter of it, my brain is in 
that comatose state when ideas are scarce or dormant. 
But then, I console myself with the generous reflection 
that ideas are scarce with most people at times ; and in 
a good many cases, — though I should not dare to say it 
of Plymouth people, — ideas are troublesome, and require 
too much hard work to manage them. It is especially 
hard to get up an original idea in this age of the world. 
Pretty much all we have have filtered down through the 
ages, and are either worn so smooth as to have no dis- 
tinguishable stamp on them, or discolored by various 
combinations, or are now and then purified and made 
more usable. They go jingling along through the brains 
of people, and sometimes get a new impetus, and strike 
us more forcibly for having been re-minted and made 
bright. It is probably fortunate that each generation 
thinks itself wiser than the last, though it may be self- 
flattery. It is not well to let hope die out of the genera- 
tions, nor of the individuals who compose them. But 
who can look at the contradictions and differences in 
human opinion, at the theories advanced and abandoned, 
at the guess-work of so-called philosophers, and the 
quarrels of scientists, and be greatly encouraged at the 
progress of absolute knowledge or the certainties of 
human attainment? When we look at the condition of 
human nature, we find that the story of sin and depravity 
is ' the. old, old story' as truly as is the story of 'Jesus 
and his love.' Verily, Solomon was right in saying, 
' There is nothing new under the sun.' Well, then, what 
have we to do but make the best of the old ? Nothing, 
of course. But it isn't always easy to know how to do 



MEMORIES. 115 

it, that is the bother. We are continually making mis- 
takes, even when we mean to do the best, to say nothing 
of those errors that spring from perversity or selfishness. 
What in the world should we do if we had no faith in 
the compassion of Him who remembers that we are 
dust? If we can only, amid all the perplexities and 
discouragements about us, believe that our Father is 
guiding us through all the mazes of our mystery, and 
pardoning and pitying us in our ignorance and helpless- 
ness, it is a consolation full of peace and rest. But, alas ! 
the vast majority of us do not really believe it. We 
think we do, but we do not. Such a faith must bring a 
perfect willingness to let the world wag as it will, and 
a perfect superiority to all the ups and downs, hithers 
and thithers, of this storm-tossed life. Don't you think 
so? Look the ground over, and see if faith is not the 
immense lack of our earthly life." 

April 4, he wrote in his diary : " In New York, at the 
St. Denis. The usual feeling of loneliness in a great city 
is upon me. Nobody knows, nobody cares for the 
stranger. The world is nothing without love." 

April 5. — Home again. It is always a joy to be wel- 
comed after an absence, and home is a sweeter word 
than ever, the nearer we get to the eternal home on high. 
Lord, help me to live for that ! 

April 6. — The burden of the morning communion- 
service falls on me this conference Sunday. Thank God 
for strength enough to bear it ! And, oh that wisdom 
and grace may be given from God to make the service a 
blessing to the people. 



Ii6 MEMORIES. 

April 7. — He hears and answers prayer. Thanks be 
to God for so much faith as I have. Oh that it were 
vastly greater ! We start to-day for Conference. It is a 
little perilous, but I hope for the defence and blessing of 
God upon all. 

This refers to the New- Hampshire Conference, which 
opened its session at Manchester on April 9. He seemed 
fully confident that it would be his last opportunity to 
meet his own Conference, and he was very anxious to do 
so "once more." All through the different exercises of 
the week, there was recurring the same thought, — "It 
will be the last time." He enjoyed it as a kind of con- 
tinual leave-taking, growing every day more weary. April 
15, he wrote : " At home. It seems very good to be in 
the old haunts and paths. A little while, and the roaming 
will cease forever. There will be a going-out without 
return. Let me keep that day suitably in mind." 

June 77. — The first sign of blood from throat, lungs, 
or somewhere about my breathing apparatus, appeared 
this morning. I am not sure but it is the beginning of 
the end. There is no better way than to look every state 
and every event calmly in the face. There are inevitable 
things that cannot be turned aside, and some things that 
can be averted by wisdom. 



CHAPTER X. 

CENTENNIAL OF MIDDLETOWN. — POEM.— VACATION. — DIARY. 
— LETTER. — PARTIAL COLLEGE WORK. — " TO NELLIE ON 
HER WEDDING-DAY." — BATTLE WITH DISEASE. —"WHAT IS 
YOUR LIFE?" — OLD CHURCH. 

ON July 14, 1884, the city of Middletown celebrated 
its first centennial. No child in all the streets, 
probably, anticipated the event more than did the invalid 
professor. 

Always fond of good music of any kind, he was espe- 
cially charmed with martial music ; and combined with 
this, the perfect order, steady tread, and uniform dress of 
militia had a strange fascination that often quite over- 
came him. Seated in an easy-chair so far down the 
lawn in front of his door, as that he might be undisturbed 
by the merry chatter of the group collected on the ve- 
randa, he remained motionless as company after company 
of the long pageant trooped by, until, fearing he might 
become exhausted, I ventured to steal beside him. The 
tears were rolling down his cheeks ; and when I said, 
" Are you having a good time?" with childish satisfac- 
tion he replied, " Oh, yes ; don't interrupt me," and con- 
tinued in that rapt state during the whole hour in which 
the procession was passing. Afterward he said, " Maybe 
you think it weak ; but I cannot explain the strange 
power military music and display has over me." He 
longed to contribute something to the success of the 



Il8 MEMORIES. 

interesting day ; and after composing a hymn, which was 
sung on the occasion, he wrote the following little poem, 
which he said was of no use except to gratify his own 
interest : — 

On this green slope of beauty rare, 

Laved by the river's happy flow, 
Sprung to its birth a city fair, 

This day a hundred years ago. 

Not massive wall, nor moat, nor tower, 

Were its foundation and defence; 
But men of heart, and men of power, 

Girded with God's omnipotence. 

For civic weal in Christian lands, 
And arts of peace with laws benign, 

No bulwarks need, or mail-clad bands, 
But virtue's arm and truth divine. 

A hundred years through sire and son, 
Of honest toil with hand and brain, 

Of wealth increased and honors won, 
Of life and death, of woe and pain. 

A hundred years of honored share 
Among her peers in war and peace ; 

In war her country's flag to bear, 
In council wise when wars should cease. 

Let but her classic shades abide, 

Let busy arts find here a home, 
Religion be her people's guide, 

In generations yet to come ; 

Then not a hundred years alone 
Shall celebrate her honored name ; 

Not ancient Troy, nor haughty Rome, 
Shall equal her enduring fame. 






MEMORIES. Iig 

Two days later, he started with his family on a long 
vacation trip which he had planned, to include visits to 
several of his kindred \ saying, " If I can endure it, it will 
be a great satisfaction to me, as well as to them, to look 
in on their homes once more." Setting his will at defi- 
ance to pain and fatigue, he entered into all the sources 
of enjoyment with cheerfulness, determined to make this 
— our last pleasure-trip — the happiest of them all. He 
revelled in the novelties of the new home of his only 
brother in Bradford, Penn., studying with interest the 
wonders of that strange oil-region, watching the perilous 
process of " shooting " an oil-well, examining with par- 
ticular minuteness the noted Kinzua bridge, three hun- 
dred and one feet in height, — said to be the highest in 
the world, — joined with delight in the family concerts, 
and the rehearsals of old-time experiences. On July 28, 
for the first time in many months, and the last time in his 
life, he preached a sermon, from Luke xviii. 8. Thence 
we went to the homes of his step-mother and his two sis- 
ters in Syracuse, N.Y., where all that loving hearts could 
devise rendered the days happy. A visit to the salt- 
works, a picnic on the lake-shore, rides about the delight- 
ful city, all added to the pleasure of kindred communion. 
The journey continued then by way of Thousand Island 
Park, St. Lawrence and its wonderful rapids, and Mont- 
real, to St. Johnsbury, Vt., " the home of his boyhood." 
Here resting for a day, he called on all who remembered 
the " Calvin " of earlier years. The warm greetings and 
pleasant rehearsal of memories, the visit to the house 
where he was born, the familiar sound of the rushing mill- 
dam, a stroll over the old farm, and especially a ramble 
in First Woods, where, seated by the cool spring, he re- 



120 MEMORIES. 

called the scenes of his childhood and youth, — all 
these rendered the time sacredly delightful. Then a few 
pleasant days in the home of a sister-in-law in New 
Hampshire, and a few more of sympathy with a sadly 
bereaved brother-in-law, and we reached our home, Aug. 
25, finding that the journey had not apparently depleted 
his strength. 

Sept. 11, the diary says : "Term begins. By the grace 
and mercy of God, I am able to begin my college work. 
May the same grace and mercy continue and help me 
to do all I do ' heartily, as unto the Lord, and not as 
unto men.' Oh for Divine help all the time ! " 

Sept. 15. — Fighting the cold weather with poor con- 
dition of body, and no provision for the severe begin- 
nings of cold weather at college. It is a little hard to 
stand the strain. I'll do my best, with God's help. 

Sept. 16. — But here I am at home sick, disabled, 
and my work goes by the board. Well, I must make the 
best of it, and still trust in the Lord, and wait. 

Sept. 24, in a letter to his brother, he says, — 

" I am not feeling very mighty to-day, so you may not 
get a very eloquent letter. I got a mysterious pull-back 
just before that hot spell came on, and all through that 
I was pretty flat. But, three or four days before the term 
began, I began to pick up, and felt pretty well. I com- 
menced my work in college with a good deal of courage 
and hope. But alas ! that cold snap ! It took me down 
worse than the ' killing frost ' in Dick Farnham's decla- 
mation. So, since last Monday, I've been an unwilling 
prisoner at home. I hardly know what ails me. The 



MEMORIES. 121 

last cold, I think, is about conquered ; but the dregs of 
a fever seem to be hanging about me, which I would a 
good deal rather see hanging in some other place. The 
thing doesn't budge, and I'm in for an enforced absence 
from my classes, whereat the scowl of impatience and 
the smile of submission are, I fear, ludicrously mingled. 
Such is the situation with this child." 

When about to resume his classes, his associate profess- 
ors most kindly arranged to relieve him from one class 
during the term, leaving him only two, that recited on 
alternate days. This amount of work, then, he assumed 
on Oct. 9, and prosecuted it during the remainder of the 
college year. 

During the whole month of December, there was an 
apparent improvement in his health, which so encour- 
aged him, that he wrote on Dec. 25 : — 

"Merry Christmas. In good health as a household, 
in peace and plenty, in love and fellowship with all, in 
good hope of everlasting life through Christ, whom we 
adore to-day, I find abundant reason for sacred gratitude 
and innocent mirth." 

Early in January, however, the persistent hand of dis- 
ease grasped tighter, and every day was one of weariness 
and struggle. On Jan. 27, in a letter to his sister, after 
speaking of others in the household, he says, — 

" As for me, the third and most important member of 
this large and noted household, I have eaten and drunken, 
lounged and slept, done considerable coughing, read 
Latin, heard one recitation at college, written two letters, 
read the papers, and received calls. Probably this de- 



122 MEMORIES. 

scribes to you the state of my health as well as if I should 
go into a technical diagnosis, with the proper thumpings 
of breast, back, and bowels, and report to you item by 
item. I am battling for life and health, just as all the 
rest of the world are, and grim Death at last gets the 
seeming victory. 

" By death I shall escape from death, 
And life eternal gain." 

Feb. 3, his journal has this entry : — 

" Nellie Prentice Merrill died yesterday morning, and 
is to be buried to-day. The long struggle is over, and 
she is at home. 'I shall see you when I get home/ 
were her last words to me. Does she see? " 

Nellie was one of his favorites. The great sorrow that 
came into her child-life, the beauty of soul it developed, 
her early-wasting health, her resolute braving of disease, 
her happy marriage only about a month before she went 
home, — all these he had watched with loving interest. 
On the morning of her marriage he sent her the follow- 
ing little poem : — 

TO NELLIE, ON HER WEDDING-DAY. 

Yes, it's only a holy linking 

Of hearts long since one in love, 
Just a seal divine, I'm thinking, 

In the register up above. 

But it pledges an arm strong and tender, 

A resting-place on a stout heart, 
In sickness or health a defender ; 

A soul-joy naught else can impart. 



MEMORIES. 123 

So the Christmas-tide blessing be on you, 
And the new year bring with it new life ; 

And the perils that threaten the maiden 
Flee away, now the maid is a wife. 

And when the good Father shall sever 

The bond that he hallows to day, 
His bridal shall bless you forever 

With pleasures that pass not away. 

His diary, at this time, has frequent reference to his 
own health : — 

March 14. — The ailments of the body become in 
time like the fetters of the slave, — almost a part of our- 
selves. We shall never know complete freedom until the 
clay-clods are shaken off. 

March 21. — The desire to live, and the dread of 
death are so strong in human nature, that the most terri- 
ble pains and distress are endured rather than death. A 
thousand deaths are suffered rather than one. If God be 
for us, who can be against us ? If we try our best to 
secure his favor and mercy, why not be at peace ? To 
be on the anxious stretch is wearing and discouraging. 
Keep a good conscience, and trust him for all. 

April 10. — Went to prayers yesterday morning for the 
first time since last September middle. Great praise to 
the kind and preserving Father, who has given me health 
and strength enough for it. 

April 20. — The body feels the pressure of daily toil, 
and the vigor of early life is wanting. It is a drag on 
the physical man, in all these days, to accomplish the 
work of life. But it is best to work. 



124 MEMORIES. 

May j. — Lib's birthday, — threescore. Thank God 
that she is in so good health, and has such good prospect 
of added years. She will outlive me, probably, by a good 
many years, but heaven re-unites. 

On this day he accompanied a beautiful gift with the 
following poem : — 

" For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appear eth for a little 
time, and then vanisheth away'* — Jas. iv. 14. 

Sixty years of so-called vapor 
Gone from life's mysterious mist; 

Six decades of that strange fog-bank — 
One more such completes the list. 

Suddenly, on life's horizon, 

Hung a cloud unseen before ; 
Suddenly, on death's horizon, 

Comes a cloud soon seen no more. 

Sometimes like the cloud on Sinai, 
With its tempest, fire, and smoke ; 

Sometimes like the veil of darkness, 
That on wondrous Calvary broke ; 

Always like the desert pillar, 

Israel's guide by day or night, 
Hallowed by the living Presence, 

Shedding forth his inner light ; 

Sometimes like Elijah's cloudlet, 

Token of the blessed rain, 
That should fill the empty fountains, 

And refresh the thirsty plain ; 

Sometimes, in the revelations 
Of the soul's diviner mood, 
Like the cloud of glory covering 
The transfigured Son of God. 



MEMORIES. 125 

When thy cloud-life nears dissolving, 

Sailing, sailing towards the west, 
May it melt, 'mid evening splendors, 

Into heaven's eternal rest. 

May 77. — My birthday. Thanks be to God for fifty- 
nine years of his ceaseless love, and unvaried forbearance, 
and abundant temporal and spiritual gifts ; for home, and 
friends, and friendships ! Lord, make the remainder rich 
with love to thee. * 

On the seventh day of June we enjoyed the commun- 
ion service in our old Methodist Episcopal Church, — 
that church hallowed by the ministrations of Fisk and 
Olin, and where hundreds of faithful ones, since taken 
home, had bowed to "drink the wine and break the 
bread." I shall never forget the thought that crowded 
into my mind, as we knelt side by side at the altar : 
" You will no more together celebrate your Lord's death 
1 till He come: " 

The following Saturday morning has this note in his 
diary : " Karl's birthday, and he is home to enjoy it with 
us. Thanks be to God, who has spared him and us till 
now. It is marked by the burning of the Methodist 
Church, which burned this morning. Now for a new 
one." 

His sorrow at the fire was less marked than might have 
been expected, for he had long felt that the cause of God 
and of Methodism was suffering from this unattractive 
place of worship. He said, a little time before, when 
money was being expended to rejuvenate it somewhat, 
" We ought to build a new one, but we never shall unless 
the Lord burns this old one down." Evidently he had a 



126 MEMORIES. 

half belief, at least, that in this way God had indeed come 
to rescue his own cause. At once he was full of zeal, in 
his prayers and plans, for rebuilding the walls of Zion, 
and of regrets that he had not strength to devote to 
earnest work for it. 



CHAPTER XL 

ALUMNI MEETING AT TILTON. — EXTRACTS FROM POEM. 

EARLY in this year he had been solicited to write a 
poem to deliver at the forty-first alumni gathering 
at the old seminary where he spent the first eight years 
after graduation. He had consented conditionally, and 
during the spring months, little by little, as his strength 
would allow, he had written it. As the time approached, 
his friends felt assured that it was too perilous an under- 
taking. But his friendships were the dearest things in 
life, and he longed to meet the old students and profes- 
sors once again. He wanted to go to that first home 
where he began domestic life, and the life of teaching 
that he had continued for thirty-three years, and give it a 
final blessing and farewell. He pleaded that, instead of 
injuring, he thought the journey, carefully taken, would 
be such a break in the fatigues of examination and com- 
mencement, that it would prove favorable. Accordingly, 
with the utmost care, the journey was made. The old first 
home was open to receive us. Though our Father had 
taken thence to himself the honored one, who, in former 
days, was our kind and genial host, yet the warmest wel- 
come and tenderest ministrations were given to the re- 
turning invalid. Carefully carried to the Seminary Hall, 
he took his place on the platform, and, with the determi- 
nation almost of desperation, he stood an hour before his 



128 MEMORIES. 

audience, making the last public literary effort of his life. 
Below are a few extracts from the poem, which was 
entitled — 

THE SCHOOL OF LIFE. 
Some teachers never die. Kearsarge, 
That yonder keeps its solemn charge, 
Lifts its bald head and furrowed brow, 
Looks calmly on the valleys now 
As when the centuries had their birth, 
And God from chaos spoke the earth. 
Over the vales and streams below, 
Where generations come and go, 
It stretches forth its hand benign, 
Utters its lessons all divine, 
Echoes God's voice, tells men to be 
Strong as the hills, as breezes free ; 
O'er low-born grovelling to rise, 
Like mountain heights to meet the skies. 

And Winnipiseogee's healthful stream, 
Born in broad waters, where the gleam 
Of mountain sunsets gilds the wave 
That ripples low, or leaps to lave 
The island's green and grassy shore — 
How, rushing seaward evermore, 
It tells us of the stream of time, 
The eternal sea, in rippling rhyme; 
Of constancy and quiet power, 
And cheerful labor every hour ! 

Nor mount and stream alone : the sky 
That arches earth, the fiery eye 
Of day, the tender orb of night, 
The twinkling worlds of starry light, — 
Each from its magisterial seat 
Speaks its own language, clear, replete 
With wisdom for the du!le>t soul 
That humbly aims for wisdom's goal. 

So, when the years their work have wrought, — 
Buried the teacher and the taught, 



MEMORIES. 129 



Reared watching tombstones o'er the grave 
Where sighing pines and cypress wave, 
Wrinkled fair brows, silvered the head, 
Given nimble feet a tottering tread, 
Set on the noblest mould of clay 
The seal of time, death, and decay, — 
Standing where once, in other years, 
Life knew its cares and hopes and fears ; 
'Mid scenes the same, yet not the same, 
Old and yet new, except in name ; 
'Tis sweet, when memory wakes the past, 
Revives the dreams that could not last, 
When voiceless shadows fill the place 
That living forms were wont to grace, 
To find some things that ne'er grow old, 
That tell the tales they've always told. 
That far-off mount and stream near by 
Tell us " some teachers never die." 



Alas that the Christian home in its ideal 
Should be so far distant from home in the real ! 
Let man make the home what his Maker designed it, 
And for making the man it leaves all schools behind it. 
The house may be palace or hovel, no matter ; 
The table-ware, silver or worn wooden platter; 
The walls, grimed with smoke, of rude logs put together, 
Or solid of marble, and proof against weather; 
The windows of holes, and the latch-string of leather, 
The lawn but a sand-heap, the stable a tether ; 
Or windows and doors of glass heavily plated, 
And lawn just a paradise newly created : 
Not these make the home, neither place nor surrounding, 
But warm and true hearts, in affection abounding. 
Yet outward adornment will match with the inner, 
Just as virtue inside is not outside a sinner; 
And beauty without will give instant impression 
What kind of a home sits in inward possession. 



130 MEMORIES. 

The dooryard, well kept with its violets and roses, 
The spirit and temper within well discloses. 
There love is enthroned, with authority blended, 
By firmness and patience and such like attended. 
The child renders ready and willing obedience 
"When the wish of the parent requires his allegiance ; 
And varied amusement, good music, good reading, 
With thousand amenities, mutual love breeding, 
Make home of all places the sweetest in pleasure, 
With dividends richer than mines of hid treasure, 
While a spirit divine as the true breath of heaven 
Takes God and his Word as the household's pure leaven. 

Let this darksome picture pass, and give brighter scenes a chance. 

On the panoramic field let the common school advance. 

From the turmoil of the town, with its atmosphere of death, 

Let us drink the draughts of life in the country's wholesome breath. 

Take a glance at the foundation of a free and happy state, — 

The humble rustic schoolhouse, insignificant yet great. 

On the slope beyond the village, or, if village there be none, 

On the grass-plat at the cross-roads, or by mossy ledge of stone, 

At the bottom of the hillside where the brook comes tumbling down, 

And the raspberry-canes with blushing fruit the pasture hillocks 

crown, 
By the pond where leaps the trout, and the dripping swallow flies, 
And among the smooth green pads the cradled lily lies, — 
On the hill and in the vale, everywhere through all the land, 
These humble, mighty schoolrooms with their hidden forces stand. 
Take a glance within the room, with its walls of wood or brick, 
Where some honest man or maiden wields the sceptre and the 

stick ; 
Where cheerful childhood faces greet the teacher's kindly look, 
As they tell the lessons over they have gathered from the book. 
Here the country's future freemen learn what freemen ought to 

know, 
And reveal the lines of promise which the coming years will show. 
Yonder bench supports a statesman, now on ardent study bent; 
This, a judge, who'll wear the ermine ; that, a future president; 



MEMORIES. 131 

Or, since all can't be presidents, nor wear a judge's wig, 
They will at least be qualified, though really not so big. 
And if the farm, the forge, the mill, shall be their after sphere, 
They'll tell the tale with pride, no doubt, that they were tutored 
here. 



Turn we now another leaf 
Of these picture-pages brief. 
'Twill occasion no surprise 
If the college meet your eyes. 
Goal of many a boyish dream, 
Goal of many a thought the theme ; 
To imagination's eye 
Clothed with awful majesty, 
Like to Delos' sacred shrine 
With its oracle divine. 
Here grave doctors sit in state, 
Dropping wisdom in debate ; 
Learned professors stuffed with lore, 
All the ancients knew, and more ; 
Libraries, whose ivied walls 
Gather in their ample halls 
Alcoves piled with ponderous tome, 
Shrining ancient Greece and Rome ; 
Or in far less dusty page 
Wise words from the modern sage. 
Thus to Fancy's distant view 
Men and things wear golden hue, 
And to young Ambition's dream 
Common things superior seem. 
But college walls are only walls, 
College halls like other halls. 
Men who tread on college ground, 
When you know them, will be found 
Just like men of common mould, — 
Some of putty, some of gold. 
Think not that the college mill 
Grinds out wise men, will or nill, 



132 MEMORIES. 

Nor that every grist contains 
Quite the maximum of brains. 
What the hopper first receives, 
That the whirling mill-stone gives ; 
'Tisn't in the college plan 
That mere grinding makes the man. 
Let the lazy dude go in, — 
Hat and cane and bosom-pin; 
If he stand the wear and tear 
Of the grinding process there, 
He'll come out as he went in, — 
Hat and cane and bosom-pin. 



Christian faith and Christian prayer, 
Christian sacrifice and care, 
Holy fire the anointing chrism, 
Holy tears the rich baptism, 
Founded colleges and schools, 
Made them freedom's sacred tools, 
Laid their corner-stones in truth, 
Fills them with our noble youth, 
Sends these, trained in heart and mind, 
Forth, a blessing to mankind, 
Trained in heart with pious care 
By the frequent voice of prayer 
Daily heard at common shrine, 
Daily honoring Power Divine. 
Thus, if the good the bad outweighs, 
Give the whole due meed of praise. 
Shall a few wrecks on the shore 
Furl all sails forevermore ? 
Shall some drones with lazy feet 
Poison all the honey sweet ? 
If bad men good things abuse, 
Shall good men have none to use ? 
Schools of learning are the stream 
Which the desert wastes redeem; 






MEMORIES, 133 

Or the dew and grateful rain, 
Fertilizing all the plain. 
Lo ! their fruitage everywhere 
Touching us like balmy air; 
Light diffused in myriad homes, 
Light condensed in myriad tomes ; 
Sweetening leaven of Church and State, 
Comforter of small and great ; 
Rills of life from heavenly sources, 
Blessing all in all their courses. 
Palsied be the recreant arm — 
Let all good men take the alarm — 
That would break the holy tie 
Linking them to God on high, 
From their walls the Bible tear, 
Hush therein the voice of prayer ! 
But, religion's handmaid mild, 
As they are religion's child, 
Let the child and mother, too, 
Fight the peaceful battle through, 
Till the King of peace shall reign 
Over land and stream and main. 



Somewhere in life's curriculum, 
Ordained by Him who knows us best, 
Sorrow, dark-browed, unbars her room, 
And bids us follow her behest. 
We dread to cross that threshold drear, 
Our feet reluctant tread her halls, 
Hung with the drapery of fear, 
Where every sight and sound appals. 
The furniture adds more dismay, 
The shroud, the casket, and the pall, 
The hearse with raven plumes that play 
And nod their grim adieus to all. 
Groans are the music echoing down 
From brazen roof and walls of art ; 



134 MEMORIES. 

Tears are the tide of sorrow's moan, — 

The blood-drops of a broken heart. 

Patience is oft the lesson set, 

And Pain the teacher strong and stern ; 

While Woe bids Pride its pride forget, 

And Grief bids Joy her tasks to learn. 

What form is that, grim, gaunt, and pale, 

We gaze upon with bated breath, 

Whose shadow wakes a smothered wail ? 

It is the dreaded teacher, Death. 

Hush ! he has hurled his fatal dart : 

What words can agony employ ? 

What still the mother's bursting heart ? 

O God ! it was my only boy. 

Hush ! still that form relentless speeds, 

Nor heeds the look that pleads though mute ; 

That stroke puts on a widow's weeds, 

And orphaned children are its fruit. 

Hush ! still glides on that stealthy tread, 

While pallor blanches every cheek; 

Beauty and strength are with the dead ; 

Eyes look the grief they cannot speak. 

In yonder churchyard, 'mid its graves, 

Sad Meditation turns her feet, 

Where willows weep and cypress waves,. 

And Sorrow rears her chosen seat. 

Hard problems, and hard lessons too, 

Beyond the skill of human ken, 

Affliction sets for me and you, 

And all the living sons of men. 

Leave them unsolved. No mortal can 

Explain the things with mystery rife ; 

Wait for the Master's voice, " I am 

The resurrection and the life." 



Some teachers never die. Kearsarge, 
That yonder keeps his silent charge, 



MEMORIES. 135 

And Winnipiseogee's cheerful roar 

Adown its slant and rocky floor, 

Like yonder starry heavens do tell 

His glory and his work full well. 

Day unto day hath voice for man, 

Night unto night reveals his plan; 

Their line encircles all the earth, 

Their voice wherever man has birth ; 

His works in earth or heaven make known 

What the eternal God hath done, 

Nor cease until this goodly frame 

Shall vanish in the final flame. 

Are breathless things more deathless than 

The living soul — immortal man? 

More true, 'some teachers never die,' 

Of mount and stream and starry sky, 

Than him whose life is God's own breath, 

Made to be victor over death ? 

Is Barrows dead ? Nay, rather, shrined 

In countless throbbing hearts, that bind 

The laurel wreath upon his head ; 

Pilgrims that oft in memory tread 

Where sighing pines their watches keep 

Above his bodys dreamless sleep. 

As pulses of the viewless light, 

That ceaseless chase the flying night, 

His words of eloquence sublime 

Shall live and work till latest time. 

And when the voice on sea and shore 

Proclaims that time shall be no more, 

The guerdon of his work-shall be 

A twofold immortality. 

And Latimer, the noble-souled, 
With learning's princes high enrolled, 
Strong in his gentleness, and great 
In gifts to bless or Church or State, — 
Has that fine soul forever fled 
To Auburn, citv of the dead ? 



136 MEMORIES. 

Lives he not yet, lives he not long, 
In human hearts, on human tongue ? 
Will not his words from wisdom's seat, 
The future generations greet, 
Caught up like echoes far away, 
To linger till the eternal day ? 

Life's varied schools and discipline 
Are all ordained by Power Divine. 
He built the earth, and spread the sea, 
And hung the starry canopy ; 
A schoolroom for the human race, 
Where each should take his proper place, 
Learners in all of earthly lore 
That fits us for an earthly shore. 

Then the great Teacher came to show 
What mortal knowledge could not know ; 
To say to all men, ' Learn of me 
The lore of immortality.' 
And some day, on his cloudy throne, 
He'll come to number up his own, 
To place them in the school on high, 
Where pupils also never die. 
That all this company be there, 
Shall be your humble poet's prayer." 



CHAPTER XII. 

EXAMINATIONS AND COMMENCEMENT. — PROFESSOR EMERI- 
TUS.— INCREASING WEAKNESS. —THE LORD'S LEADING.— 
MUSIC. 

HAVING thus accomplished his purpose, he returned 
to Middletown the following day. June 19, he 
wrote : " Home again ! How sweet the word ! The Lord 
has given me strength thus far. Now for another hard 
day. But 'as thy days, so shall thy strength be.' Lord^. 
help me to take the promise. " 

The three examinations he would have had on three 
successive days, must be, from his absence, crowded 
into this one. But though his kind colleagues begged 
to relieve him of the work, he said, " No : I have fin- 
ished my year thus far, I will not fail at the end." 

He attended the three examinations in college, fin- 
ished computing the standing of his classes, and passed 
in his report, as was his custom at the close of every 
term. He examined the proof of the " Obituary Record 
of the Alumni of the University," which he had pre- 
pared, — a work he had done annually since 1863; and 
when all was accomplished, then he meant to rest. Sat- 
urday morning, the 20th, he wrote : " Sustained to do the 
necessary work of yesterday, and apparently no worse for 
it. To-day I hope to rest. Oh, how good the word 
seems ! It seems to me I never knew what it was to be 
tired till now." Still he hoped that the vacation would so 



138 MEMORIES. 

recruit him that he might be able to take at least as 
much and perhaps more work the next year than he had 
done in the last. But the record in his diary on the 24th 
of the same month is as follows : — 

" Who knoweth what a day may bring forth ? I am 
suddenly made professor emeritus, without work, on half 
pay. It is probably the wisest course, and the best for 
me. So the Lord's will be done, and may I be the 
better." 

The evening before, as he returned exhausted from a 
ride to the society receptions, he found awaiting him 
two of the trustees of the college, who announced to 
him the above fact. Though he received it with appar- 
ent calmness, it was like an unexpected thunderbolt. 
"Why," said he when they left, "what are we to do ? 
I am without any warning thrown out of my work, and my 
means of support half cut off." — I said, "We must live 
on the half, then." — "We cannot do it," said he, "it is 
impossible. We have never, since we kept house, lived 
on so little as that, and with the great increase of expense 
resulting from my sickness it is impossible. And what 
does it all mean?" he continued. "It indicates very 
plainly what others think of my case. Evidently, in their 
opinion, my life-work is done." For a few days the 
cloud was heavy upon him. Then he began to see the 
silver lining, and to see God out of the thick darkness. 
He said, " After all, it is all of the Lord. I do not want 
to remain in my place in college to be a hinderance to 
its prosperity. Others probably understand better than I 
can, what is best in this matter. So, though I did want 
to stand at my post as long as possible, probably it is 



MEMORIES. 139 

better thus. The trustees are under no legal obligation 
to give me any thing. A half loaf is far better than 
none." And so his prayers were changed to praises, and 
he repeatedly expressed afterward his belief that the 
hand of the Lord was in it all. 

He attended a part of the exercises of commencement 
day, greeted with pleasure many old friends, and enjoyed 
heartily the guests in his home, especially his old-time 
friends Professor H. B. Lane and wife. It was the chair 
of the genial and generous Professor Lane that he took 
on first coming to his work in Wesleyan, and he ex- 
pressed great gratification that he was able to entertain 
them in his home once more. When all was over, and 
the stimulus of the yearly festival gone, he began to 
realize more fully his weakness. He and Professor 
Westgate had a few weeks before engaged rooms for 
themselves and families for a few weeks in a house 
together at the Adirondacks. Both found the project 
must be abandoned. The news of Professor Westgate's 
death reached him on July 29, and was a great surprise 
and shock. " I had no idea/' said he, " that he was so 
far gone. He is at rest, and is to be envied for his calm 
repose." Only a day later, Professor J. C. Burke was 
also laid away to rest. Mr. Harrington was very desir- 
ous to attend both these burial-services, but reluctantly 
gave it up, as his strength was quite unequal to the strain 
upon his emotions. So close together these two whom 
he admired and loved were taken home ! He said, 
" The fighting for life and health goes on, but it seems 
sometimes a useless warfare. Death marches on. The 
influential and wealthy do not escape. The young and 
strong are seized." 



140 MEMORIES. 

Time unoccupied began to be burdensome, and the 
heat of summer was exceedingly oppressive to his weak- 
ness. He said, " My work must be to endure, chiefly, 
yet something useful and helpful may be done to some- 
body." 

A visit from his youngest sister greatly relieved the 
tediousness of two or three weeks. The hours were filled 
with delightful communion, and a union of faith and 
prayer. " What would the world be," said he, " without 
the loves and charities of men? It is one of God's 
richest bestowments to give us kind friends." When she 
left he noted it in his diary, adding, " It is not very likely 
I shall ever see her again in this world. We have had a 
pleasant visit, and I am thankful for having had her with 
us for a while." 

On the morning of Aug. 10, he wrote in his diary : 
" Thirty-three years ago to-day 1 How different the 
situation ! What a world of good things has been the 
outcome of that day ! The years of the generation have 
been full of blessing." 

We talked that day of all the way God had led us ; 
and he exclaimed, " If ever a man had cause for grati- 
tude to God for thirty-three years of blessedness, I am 
he." I answered, "We have had a great many good 
times together." — "Oh," said he, "they have been all 
good ; they have been constantly growing better, and 
these last times are the very best of the whole." 

His confidence in the special care and leading of 
Divine Providence was unwavering, and during the last 
years was constantly increasing. During these summer 
and autumn months, he spent much time in his hammock 
in the grove in the rear of his home, either in conversa- 



MEMORIES. 141 

tion, reading, or listening to reading. One day he said, 
" Bring out the old letter-box, and let us look over our 
past a little." For several days thereafter, we found this 
a pleasant pastime. Selecting here and there different 
epochs in our history, we called up the circumstances, 
and remembered the questionings and the motives that 
had influenced our course, and the helplessness with 
which we had asked God's guidance ; and here now, 
standing on the elevation of experience, we could see 
plainly the wonderful pillar of cloud by day, and of fire 
by night, that in all the years had safely led us on. 
Again and again he exclaimed, " I can account for it in 
no other way. It was the hand of God." And this 
was no cold theory to him. God's presence and God's 
love and God's especial care were living realities. This 
little poem written on the night of Dec. 31, 1880, was 
the expression of his sincerest faith : — 

THE LORD'S LEADING. 

" And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee." 
— Deut. viii. 2. 

Sitting by the whitening embers 

Of the shivering, dying year, 
Ah ! how well my soul remembers 

All the way he led me here. 

Sheltered by the Rock of Ages, 

By Siloa's healthful tide, 
Where no stormy tempest rages, 

He hath led me by his side. 

In the mines where God's hid treasure 

Gleams in galleries of gold, 
'Mid the wealth of his good pleasure, 

He hath made my path unfold. 



142 MEMORIES. 

Battling in the billowy sweetness 

Of his mercy's ocean store, 
I had drowned, o'erwhelmed with riches ; 

But he led me to the shore. 

When the path grew dark with sorrow, 

Still I held his loving hand ; 
And he gave a brighter morrow, 

Brought me to a pleasant land. 

Every step my Lord hath led me, 

Through the swiftly circling y6ar ; 
All the way his bounty fed me, 

Soothed my sadness, calmed my fear. 

Thankful, him my soul remembers, 

Sitting by the hearthstone here, 
Where the slowly whitening embers 

Maik the shivering, dying year. 

One of these days he spoke of the probability that he 
could not remain with me much longer. I said, " If I 
could go with you, I would be satisfied to have it so." — 
" Yes, we would love to go together," he answered ; 
" but that would make it too sad for Karl. I should 
like to live to see him happy in a home of his own. I 
cannot expect it ; but I want you to live to encourage 
and help him until he has his own family, and is well 
established in life." His diary of Aug. 22 says, " Karl 
left us this morning for Wilbraham. It seems hard to be 
without him ; but the best thing for him is to go out 
alone, and battle with the world. God bless him with 
the indwelling Spirit ! " 

The loneliness of the following week was relieved by 
a visit from his only brother. Lying in his hammock 



MEMORIES. 143 

while his brother sat by, they talked of their boyhood 
and youth ; and many a time the old trees above them 
echoed their hearty laughter as they recalled the sports 
and freaks, adventures and escapes, of those early days. 
Then they spun the thread on into manhood ; and their 
voices grew solemn and tender, as they mingled their 
words of Christian faith, and strengthened each other 
with their firm, glad hope of an immortality together. 

Aug. 2 7 he wrote in the diary : " Leonard left us last 
night. The visit has been a very pleasant one. Is it 
the last?" So it proved. 

That day he seated himself at the organ, and ran over 
the keys for some time, then scribbled a bit. Being 
asked, "What are you doing ?" he laughed, and said, 
" Listen, and I'll show you." Then he played and sang 
to a tune he had just made the following words : — 

" Lord, for to-morrow and its needs, 
I do not pray ; 
Keep me, my God, from stain of sin 
Just for to-day. 

" Let me both diligently work, 
And duly pray ; 
Let me be kind in word and deed, 
Just for to-day. 

" So for to-morrow and its needs, 
I do not pray ; 
But keep me, guide me, love me, Lord, 
Just for to-day." 

His brother-in-law had sent him the hymn to set to 
music, a few weeks earlier ; and he had replied he was 
too weak to attempt it. But now it relieved the sadness 



144 MEMORIES. 

of the recent departure. Twice afterward, he went to 
the organ, and sang and played the same thing. The 
sentiment was a helpful one in his condition, and he 
enjoyed it. Since his boyhood he had frequently prac- 
tised the composition of music, and was in the habit of 
cutting from papers bits of poetry that especially pleased 
him, and adapting them to song. Dr. Warren's " Home- 
ward Bound " was thus brought into use. He wrote the 
music while teaching at Sanbornton Bridge, and sang it 
often in social meetings. One of his pupils asked for a 
copy of it, which he wrote for her. During vacation 
she attended camp-meeting, and sang it. It was quickly 
caught up by the musical brother Dadmun, and soon 
came out in a volume of his, but with such change in 
arrangement that the author never afterward enjoyed 
singing it, except alone. 

" The Lord will provide " was another written in the 
same way; and in his last diary were left several little 
stray poems, awaiting his leisure to put them to music. 
Many songs he sang at funerals were in music that had 
never been written, but lived only in his own soul of 
melody. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

FAILING PHYSICAL AND INCREASING SPIRITUAL STRENGTH.— 
— "BORDER-LAND." — VISITS. — LETTERS. — KINDNESS OF 
FRIENDS. — PREACHING. — HEART-SEARCHINGS. — BISHOP 
FOSS. — DAY OF PRAYER. — NIGHT-EXPERIENCES. 

ONE more entry in Mr. Harrington's diary, which 
he had kept with scarcely an omission of a day, 
except in sickness, for nearly a third of a century, and 
the last he ever wrote, was made on Aug. 31 : " So ends 
the month, and the summer. What a change it has 
brought to many ! For me, the slow decline, and near- 
ing steps of death. Yet the Lord is in it all. I will 
praise him." During that week there had come a sud- 
den failing of strength, that was very marked. He 
thought the end was rapidly approaching, and with this 
belief came a great uplifting of spirit. On Sunday, at the 
hour for church service, I read to him, as was my cus- 
tom, portions of Scripture, and other religious works of 
his own selection. "Read me, to-day," said he, "the 
fourteenth chapter of John." As I read, he continually 
interrupted me with comments and praises, and tears of 
joy. When I reached the twenty-seventh verse, he said, 
" Oh, stop there ! I can't bear any more. That verse fills 
me full, full. Glory to God ! " For an hour he contin- 
ued in an ecstasy of joy ; and for days thereafter he was 
full of joyous anticipations, thinking himself greatly favored 
to be so near the beautiful home above. One morning 



146 MEMORIES. 

he exclaimed, " I will praise the Lord at all times ; his 
praise shall continually be in my mouth." Then added, 
" I have no dread of death, but a calm rest in the Lord. 
I do not think it is stupor, but it is what Dr. Ladd used 
to call it, great peace ; a wonderful comfort. I have no 
doubts, no fears, no dreads. I am in my Father's hands. 
I have such a wonderful victory over the temptations 
that all my life have been a curse to me. It seems to me 
now, if I could go back, it would be so easy to put them 
all under my feet." 

Some one mentioned to him the little poem he had 
written entitled "The Border- Land." He answered, 
" The best thing about that is, it is all my own present 
experience." 

On the solemn border standing 

Of the land unseen, unknown, 
'Neath Death's shadow, hushed I listen 

For the hymns around the throne. 
Doubts and fears around me thronging 

Swell the load of daily care : 
Who shall satisfy my longing? 

Who my burdens help to bear ? 

Jesus comes ; his gentle finger 

Lifts the load, and it is gone ; 
Jesus comes ; where shadows linger, 

Lo ! the purpling of the morn ; 
And when trembling fear comes o'er me, 

When 'mid doubts I scarce can pray, 
If the Master stand before me, 

Doubts and fears all melt away. 

When my guilty soul sinks under 

All the crushing weight of sin, 
Jesus comes ; O joy and wonder ! 

Strength and hope are back again. 



MEMORIES. 147 

He gives victory in my conflict ; 

He from sorrow sends release ; 
When the gathering storm is darkest, 

Jesus lifts the bow of peace. 

One of the alumni came to call on his former teacher ; 
and in reply to questions, Professor Harrington answered, 
" My body is pretty weak, but it is well with my soul. 
Cooper, I am just as happy as I can be." He was not 
only happy in his religion now, but he was happy in every 
thing, entering into all the topics of the day with pleasure. 

During the months of September and October he 
received visits from his eldest sister, his brother's wife, 
and from a nephew who bore his name, and possessed 
very nearly his own voice for singing. With great delight, 
Mr. Harrington would lie on the lounge, selecting song 
after song of his favorites, and listen to their rendering. 
Kindred ties were especially sacred to him. In a letter 
dictated to his sister, after her departure, he says, " May 
the Lord bless your soul and body, and give you health 
and peace ; and every member of your family be in- 
cluded ! There is nothing I desire more for my kindred, 
whom I love, than that they be kept in the love of God, 
and have an abiding hope of eternal life. Next to that, 
I wish them such worldly prosperity as will make them 
comfortable in this life, and able to do good as they have 
opportunity. My thoughts run to you and to your inter- 
ests very often. I desire the health especially of the 
household, and look in upon you in imagination, and fol- 
low you in your daily life. I carry along in my thoughts, 
and frequently recur with gratitude to, the loving atten- 
tions and kindness that you have so often shown us, and 
hope the Lord may reward you." 



148 MEMORIES. 

In another letter, after speaking of the pleasure the 
visits had given him, he said, "So all the blessings of 
life show the exceeding mercies of God to make afflic- 
tion light, and the burden of sickness less heavy to bear. 
And mightier than all, for help and support, are the 
everlasting arms that hold me constantly in their loving 
embrace. God lets me have a clear light and a confident 
trust. I cannot give you the details of my experience 
beyond this. My health does not vary, that is, apparently, 
from day to day. What the invisible progress of the dis- 
ease is working, time only will tell ; and that I await with- 
out fear or anxiety." 

One Sunday he asked to hear Dr. Speaks article on 
"The Heavenly Home," found in the "Independent" 
of Oct. i, 1885. 

After we had expressed our mutual adoption of its 
sentiments, he said, " I am so glad that this is the faith 
of us both, that we can rest in the Bible-promises, and 
that they are so real to us. It is not God's plan to let 
husband and wife go over the river of death together, 
but we can go together to its edge ; and I can't help be- 
lieving that there will be some little link that will hold 
when we are in the two worlds. And the separation will 
be short, — oh, so short/" Then, after a little, he added, 
" I do hope I shall not get impatient. I hope I shall be 
willing to wait all God's time. Whether it is only a 
week, or I have to suffer on for months, it is all right, 
all right. And I do hope I may be able to make God's 
will my will, — to wait patiently." I said, "Would you 
really rather go now, than to wait any longer? " — "If it 
were God's will, — yes, oh, yes!" he answered. Then, 
looking up, he said, " Only for the separations, I would 



MEMORIES, 149 

be glad to go home now. It will be hard to leave you 
and Karl, — I cannot think of that, — but that must come, 
and it will make but little difference when. A short 
separation, and then a whole eternity together." 
I asked if he thought he was growing weaker. 
"Sometimes I do," said he; "especially yesterday 
and to-day. I am so tired!' 1 Once he said, " Oh, this 
dreadful cough is so tiresome ! " then immediately 
checked himself, and added, " But it is God's will, and 
so it is my will." 

During the following two or three weeks his strength 

rallied again considerable. As I finished his toilet one 

morning, he said, " How much longer will you have to 

do all this for me ? — " How much longer shall I have 

the privilege?" said I. "But if I should live on and 

on for months? " he said. " For years I would be happy 

in doing it, only for the grief of seeing you suffer," I 

answered. He smiled, and said, "Well, I am thankful 

that I do not have to suffer very seriously. If it were 

not for this short breath, I could do considerable ; with 

this, I can't do any thing ; but when I lie quiet I suffer 

comparatively little, and no acute pain. I ought to be 

so thankful ! " I spoke of the joy of having him here, 

and said if I should allow my mind to dwell on his going 

away, I could not care for him as he needed. " Oh, do 

not do that : there is no need to anticipate sorrow," said 

he. "Let us enjoy each other while we can. Let us 

live in the present 'just for to-day.' " Then, referring to 

his exultant joy a few weeks before, when he thought he 

was going very soon, he said, " I do not need that now ; 

but I have what I do need, — grace of patience to wait. 

Just the grace needed will come just when and as we 



ISO MEMORIES. 

need it." I said, " I am glad you do not wear an un- 
happy or distressed face, as many sick ones do." He 
replied, " I have too much confidence in God's constant 
and minute care over me, to feel unhappy at any thing 
he does." 

He especially enjoyed the sacrament of the Lord's 
Supper. I think he had the fulness of that experience 
expressed by Dr. Cuyler in the words, "Sometimes at 
the Lord's table, Jesus comes into the soul just as he did 
into that upper chamber where the disciples were as- 
sembled." On the first day of November, he said, " As 
we cannot go to communion in the church to-day, we 
must do the best we can to get the same blessings at 
home. Read the fifty-first Psalm. That is such a full 
confession of sin, and contrite humbling of soul, it seems 
to me especially appropriate for us all at such a time." 
His responses to it indicated his own contrition of spirit 
before God. Then he asked for some of his favorite 
hymns, — " There's a wideness in God's mercy." Oh, 
with what pathos he repeated the lines, — 

" And the heart of the Eternal 
Is most wonderfully kind ! " 

He greatly delighted in the reading of the Psalms. 
" How full they are," said he, " of a settled, unwavering 
confidence in God ! David seems not to have had a 
shadow of a doubt of the reality and character of the 
Creator. Read me Lucy's Psalm," — referring to the 
121st, which a friend had quoted in a conversation with 
him. After the reading, he said, "Now, see if I can 
repeat it right." And having done so, he exclaimed, 
"Oh, yes! my help cometh from the Lord." He called 



MEMORIES. 151 

for several others, and finally said, " Now read me some 
of the short ones, near the end of the book, that are all 
full of praise." And his own praises were very fervently 
added. He talked much of the " peace of God," and 
tried to express what " the peace of God that passeth all 
understanding " was to him. He finally summed it up 
by : " ' It is Christ with us and Christ in us.' As I lay 
coughing last night," he continued, "I thought, 'I know 
now what the apostle meant by "joy unspeakable." ' I 
used to wonder if I should ever understand it : now I 
think I do. I know what it is. Praise the Lord ! " 

He was exceedingly appreciative of any acts of kind- 
ness received, and these acts were continually multiplied 
by all about us. 

When his strength so suddenly failed the last of August, 
it became exceedingly difficult for him to go up-stairs, 
and he could only do so by leaning very heavily with 
both hands, and resting on each stair. Mr. Merrill, who 
had taken his work in the Latin department, came often 
to consult him, and cheer him with reports from his 
classes. On the evening of Sept. 3, he proposed to help 
him up-stairs, saying, " I can carry you up, professor, in 
my arms." Mr. Harrington laughed at the idea as prepos- 
terous ; but his friend persisted, and with much pleading 
was finally allowed to try it. I shall never forget the look 
of relief and delight as he was placed safely in the chair 
in his chamber, and saw that the dreaded task was spared 
him. Every night afterward, this great kindness was 
shown him. Tutor White, the son of a dear college class- 
mate, begged the privilege of sharing in this labor of love ; 
and, soon afterward, he began to come also each morning 
about eleven o'clock to take him down to the parlor. 



152 MEMORIES. 

And so many weary months, that must otherwise have 
been spent shut in a sick-chamber, were made far more 
cheerful and happy in the family parlor, where he enjoyed 
calls of neighbors and friends, and interested himself in 
all the topics of the household and city. 

On Sunday, Nov. 15, after Mr. White left him on the 
lounge, he burst into tears ; and when asked the cause, 
he said, " I was thinking of the goodness of God. Every 
thing about me is so pleasant, so comforting; I have 
been brought down-stairs so safely, so easily ; my swollen 
limb is a little better, and every thing tells of God's won- 
derful kindness. " I answered, " We have not half found 
out his goodness yet." — " Half learned it ! Talk of half 
finding out an unfathomable fact 1 '" he exclaimed. I 
read the 103d Psalm. Said he, " I believe that, and the 
23d, and 121st, and 27th, are the ones I like a little 
the best." Then, with emphasis, he added the 91st, and 
said, " I guess we shall find a good many more we shall 
want to class with these." 

On Monday he inquired about the services of the pre- 
ceding day, then compared his Sundays now and for- 
merly. He said, " I used to feel it a terrible cross to 
preach in College Chapel. I did not have at all the 
assurance that it was my duty to do so, for I always 
questioned if it were not a disadvantage to the students. 
It seemed to me to give them an indolent, irresponsible 
church-life. Then I dreaded every effort I made there, 
you cannot conceive how severely; partly because I 
doubted the wisdom of the whole plan ; partly because 
my audience came to hear me by compulsion ; especially 
because I disliked to be pitted against some others who 
had been pastors for years, and had a quantity of ser- 



MEMORIES, 153 

mons ready, so they could preach with comparatively 
little effort. But perhaps that was just the discipline the 
Lord saw I needed. I know I did struggle hard against 
that temptation, — as I presume now it was. I said to my- 
self, ' It is none of your business ; you have no right to 
make your personal success any motive in your Christian 
work. All pride, and envy, and ambition, should be 
entirely overcome in this matter/ I know I used to pray 
a good deal over every sermon. Especially I remember 
the sermon on prayer. I felt a great burden on that sub- 
ject, and I begged God to help me speak the truth." 

During the month of December he continually lost 
flesh and strength, though his appetite and digestion were 
both good. At some times he would talk quite hopefully 
of being able to preach and sing again. On other days 
he would talk of the better land, and rejoice in anticipa- 
tion of it. He was constantly cheerful and often quite 
merry, amusing himself in all the little occurrences of the 
times. He dictated a letter on Dec. 5, commencing as 
follows : "We have just finished, Lib and I, our dinner- 
duet, consisting, by the programme, of common and 
sweet potatoes, beefsteak, and celery for a relish. There 
were two solo parts ; Lib's was bread and butter, and 
mine onions. The second part of the programme was 
pumpkin-pie and apples. The performance was very 
successful, and no doubt we shall be called upon to 
repeat the programme. 

" Now I am stretched on the lounge — which I occupy 
much of the time — digesting my dinner, coughing at 
intervals, and dictating this epistle. It is a gloomy day 
out of doors, but inside there is comfort ; not only in the 
supply of our wants, and in the providential surroundings, 



154 MEMORIES. 

but in the communion of two that have long been one, 
and whom time and growing age, and the tests of these 
later days, weld together in a more inseparable union. 
And when you add to these the 'peace of God that 
passeth all understanding,' what more could we ask to 
sweeten our daily joys? And yet other things do en- 
hance the enjoyments of our life. We have just proved it 
in the vacation visit of Karl and Carrie, who brought the 
light of young hearts to cheer and stir us up." — I queried 
a bit here as to the correctness of his rhetoric, when 
he said, " Oh, you wait ; I shall make that all right," and 
immediately added, " as a lamp carried into an old closet 
stirs up the old beetles, and bugs, and spiders, from their 
lairs, and sets them to taking healthy exercise." 

At this time he was unable to bear his own weight, and 
only sat up two or three hours a day. As the month 
progressed, he began to suffer more from short breath, 
and many days his fever was very high. Still his energy 
of spirit did not forsake him. Several times during the 
month he rode for an hour in the bracing air, and returned 
refreshed. On Saturday, the 29th, he went out for the 
last time. He was driven to the new church building, 
where he was interested in its progress and proportions. 
The whole ride was pleasing, and gave him subject for 
recreative thought some days. Several times afterward 
he proposed riding, but failed to obtain his physician's 
approval. His cough increased, and during the nights 
was especially severe. Early in January, he called out 
once, about midnight, " Who is it that shall ascend into 
the hill of the Lord? Who shall stand in his holy 
place?" I replied, "He that hath clean hands and a 
pure heart." — " What else? " said he, " I want to apply 



MEMORIES. 155 

the whole test to myself." I continued, "Who hath not 
lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully." — 
" Yes, ' sworn deceitfully] " said he : "are you sure I have 
not done that?" — "Why, of all things, yes, I am sure 
you never swore deceitfully." — " But," said he, " I want 
to be very sure. You remember I have one share in the 
stock company ; I did not put it into my tax- 
list." — " Why should you? " said I. " It is not worth a 
penny, has brought you no interest for years, and proba- 
bly never will be of any value to you." — "Ah! that 
makes no difference," he said ; " the question is, does 
the law require me to report it ? I did not think of it 
when I made out my list, and I do not suppose it should 
be reckoned, because as a corporation it pays taxes in 
another State. But I want you to write to Homer," — a 
brother-in-law, — " and ask if by any law of Connecticut 
or New York that ought to be put in my tax-list." When 
the reply came assuring him there was none, he said, 
" Well, that is settled ; I don't know of any thing else I 
have not attended to correctly." He talked very fre- 
quently, and with perfect freedom, of the changes that 
were coming to us. He made all arrangements possible 
for the future comfort of his family ; he gave advice on 
many little matters that it seemed marvellous he should 
remember in the midst of his suffering. He received 
calls during all this month from all the friends who came. 
It was a great pleasure to him to see them. And espe- 
cially he enjoyed the visits of those who conversed freely 
with him of mutual Christian experience ; and expressed 
much surprise that the majority of Christians, and even 
Christian ministers, did not talk more of their own reli- 
gious experience. 



156 MEMORIES. 

He said, one day, as I went into his room, " I have 
some comfort in the promise you read me this morning, 
' He who hath begun a good work in you will perform it 
until the day of the Lord Jesus.' I am sure / have begun 
no good work, but I am sure a good work has been begun 
in me, for I know that something has helped me to over- 
come the carnal nature ; and I don't believe He who has 
begun it will leave it unfinished." 

"Read me some of the 119th Psalm," said he; "that 
gets neglected because it is so long." After the reading 
of that, he said, " Now read the hymn ' Abide with me.' " 
When the hymn was ended, he repeated, with much em- 
phasis and emotion, all of the last stanza, and added, 
"He will. I am sure he will. 11 This hymn he asked 
for very often, and often repeated, and more than once 
sang it in the night, once when he was fast asleep. Also, 
once during sleep he sang clearly, — 

" Jesus, my all, to heaven is gone, 
He whom I fix my hopes upon ; 
His track I see, and I'll pursue 
The narrow way till him I view." 

Sunday, Jan. 24, he spent in his chamber, and most 
of the day in bed. In the afternoon Bishop Foss, who 
came to the city the preceding evening, called to see him. 
The hour was one of the most delightful to him of all 
his sickness. The bishop had been down to the gates 
of death, and he knew just how to touch the chords of 
heavenly comfort that would vibrate harmoniously in that 
place. They compared their experiences, and neither 
needed to explain. The fewest words were understood. 
Heart answered heart, as they talked of the revelations 



MEMORIES. 157 

from "the land that is not very far off; " and when they 
again communed together with their Lord, he bent so low 
to hear them, that it seemed to us who knelt by almost 
the mount of transfiguration. All the next day, as he lay 
on his lounge, he lived over that hour. Some one re- 
marked that the bishop knew what topic would be accept- 
able to him. He answered, with a humorous face, " Why, 
if Bishop Foss had spent the hour in my room last night 
in rehearsing his European plans, I should have thought 
him insane." On Tuesday afternoon the kind bishop 
came again, with Mrs. Foss, and again the theme was 
" Jesus and the resurrection ; " and when he finally com- 
mended his dying friend to God, to " our Elder Brother, 
his Brother, my Brother," there came a sense of security 
and blissful rest that never left him afterward. 

The next day, — the day preceding the " day of prayer 
for colleges," — he asked if I should think him wild if he 
should say he was wondering if he could not be carried 
to the college chapel to-morrow, so he might talk, "just 
for a few minutes," in the prayer-meeting. He said, " I 
do so long to talk to the students once more ! I want to 
try to impress them with the importance of the Christian 
life. I want them to see as I see it from my present 
stand-point. It is strange to me that so much of my 
work has been done from a sense of duty. Oh, if I could 
work now, I should work from a real, warm love for the 
Master and his cause. It seems to me I could convince 
everybody of the reality and blessedness of the Christian 
faith." When convinced he could not go, he wondered 
if he could meet the students in the parlors at home. 
For a few hours he indulged the pleasant thought ; then 
he said, " I am afraid I could not endure it. My emo- 



158 



MEMORIES. 



tion would overcome me, and my strength would fail. 
No, I can only speak to one and another separately, as 
they call to see me." Nothing gave him more pleasure 
than the occasional visits from his former pupils. 

On Thursday, the 28th, he spent much time in prayer 
for the blessing of God upon the day, and watched eagerly 
for some one to tell him how the meetings at college were 
resulting. 

In the afternoon Dr. Hunt, who had preached in col- 
lege chapel in the morning, called. His words of greet- 
ing were, " I wanted to come and congratulate you upon 
being so near the heavenly home." It was a welcome 
keynote. Mr. Harrington readily took it up, and for a 
half-hour he exulted in a conversation that led him almost 
out of sight of bodily ills ; and the prayer that followed, 
to "our Father, our Saviour, our Comforter," brought 
answer of abiding joy. 

The following night was one of great suffering, but, in 
the midst of one of the severest paroxysms of coughing, 
I noticed a particularly bright expression flit over his face. 
It seemed like a light reflected on him. I said at once, 
" Calvin, what is it ? " — " I'll tell you as soon as I can," 
said he, smiling ; and, when he was able to talk, he said, 
" My hard coughing made me know I could not stand 
such racking much longer, and the thought came to me, 
' Soon people will be saying, " He is dead." ' I thought 
how, in my old home, the word would go from one to 
another, ' Calvin Harrington is dead.' Then the thought 
came, ' But / shall be saying, No, not dead ; I am alive 
forevermore? " Then he dwelt most exultantly upon the 
"bliss of immortality," "life eternal." He said, " I fully 
believe that I shall live forever / " and he praised God for 
the glorious hope. 



MEMORIES. 159 

Another night, between fearful spasms of coughing, he 
said, " I have been thinking what a glorious offset this 
doctrine of the resurrection is, to the difficulty we have of 
comprehending God. I have been troubled, for a day or 
two, with the thought of the eternity of God. How can 
we conceive of a Being without beginning, without end, 
without cause ? We cannot take it in, and I have been 
struggling against the doubts it suggests. But just now 
the resurrection of Jesus came to me, and that matches 
it." 



CHAPTER XIV, 

HEMORRHAGE. — PRAYER. — DAILY ROUTINE. — LETTERS. — 
HYMNS.— CALLS. — APPROACH OF DEVTH. — DIRECTIONS. — 
MESSA ^ES. — LAST PRAYER-MEE TING. — LAST SLEEP. — " INTO 
THOSE MANSIONS."- KINDNESS OF FRIENDS. — MEMORIAL 
OF FACULTY. 

DURING the night of Saturday, Jan. 30, he had his 
first hemorrhage. It was slight in the beginning, 
but increased rapidly, and was apparently the breaking-up 
of a deep-seated pulmonary ulcer. This drew heavily on 
his little remaining strength, so we all saw he was going 
down with increased rapidity. For two or three days he 
conversed but little. On Sunday he said, " I will not try 

to talk any until Mr. comes [a student who had 

promised to call on that afternoon], so I may save all my 
strength for a little time with him. I want, if possible, to 
induce him to become an out-spoken Christian. " 

From the night of Aug. 10, 1852, it had been our 
invariable custom to unite our evening prayers at the 
bedside. Monday evening, Feb. 1, lying in his bed, 
paler and weaker than ever before, he prayed with un- 
usual fervor, and for so many objects,- — the Church he 
loved, the especial state of it here, the missionary of the 
cross, the preachers of God's word everywhere, the col- 
lege, the professors, the students, Bishop Foss and family 
upon the deep, Dr. Hunt, and several others who had 
especially asked his prayers, his own kindred, — all were 



MEMORIES. 161 

remembered with such an earnestness ot desire, as if he 
had just then an especial audience with the Deity, and 
hastened to put in all his pleas, with the certain knowl- 
edge that they would be regarded. Then, oh, how 
tenderly ! he prayed for me and " the dear ones at Wil- 
braham." 

I said, when he ceased, " O Calvin, what can I do 
when I can no longer have your prayers?" Heb. i. 14 
coming to mind just at the moment, I quoted it. " Yes, 
yes," said he, "you have that text, and you have this, 
' Thy Maker is thy husband ; ' and this, ' Let thy widows 
trust in me ; ' and oh, so many more precious promises . r 
We don't know whether I am to go soon, but I think 
my failing strength these last few days squints that way. 
I wish I could sing ! " and, with great eifort, he sang the 

lines, — 

" We shall see him as he is 
By and by, when he comes ; 
We shall see him as he is, 
When he comes." 

It was his last song before Jesus came to lead him into 
that great company who sing around the throne. 

The next day he wished to be brought down-stairs, 
saying, " I don't like to give up entirely until I am com- 
pelled to do so." He lay on the lounge in the parlor, and 
looked again on all the familiar home scenes. With help, 
he walked once more to the dining-room, and ate his 
last dinner at the family table. But the day was a very 
weary one, and the next morning he said calmly, he 
thought " he would not try to leave his room any more." 

Most of the remaining time was spent in bed. Towards 
evening each day, he was helped to an easy-chair, where 



162 MEMORIES. 

he sat about two hours, resting, eating his supper, and 
attending family prayers. For a week he prayed each 
time himself ; the effort becoming too great for him, he 
called the last week on other members of the family. 
During the first of these two weeks, he saw very little 
company, but tried to rest, and conscientiously used 
every means for health, as if he knew it might be avail- 
able. After his morning toilet, his breakfast, and an 
hour's rest, he listened daily to his own selections from 
the Bible, and his favorite hymns. Then he conversed a 
while on what had been read, and often his thoughts 
seemed to reach out into the unseen, and he would lie 
apparently rapt in a delightful communion with the 
Comforter. After this he invariably called for the read- 
ing of the daily paper, and listened with interest to all 
the secular news, commenting upon it with the same 
interest as if he were in active life. Then followed a 
time of quiet, a sort of half-dozing, for some time before 
dinner. One day at this hour I thought him asleep, and 
was very quiet, so as not to disturb tils rest. At last 
he opened his eyes full of humor, and said, " You need 
not go tipping around any longer; I have not been 
asleep." I said, " What have you been doing? " — " Get 
your tablet, and I'll tell you," said he. When I was 
ready, he dictated four stanzas of a little poem, the first 
five of which he had written in a similar way a week 
before. When I expressed approval, and said, " I'll send 
it to the paper," he replied, " If you do, I'll whip you ; 
I only made it to keep myself busy, and it is not worth 
printing at all. Now, remember, don't let any of these 
things that I have written in my weak condition ever see 
the light. If you are foolish enough to enjoy them, you 
can have them." 



MEMORIES. 163 

He received many letters from friends, which were 
sources of great comfort. He had frequently been called 
upon to sing some selection at funeral services. This he 
es:eemed a sacred privilege. One morning he rece: r 1 
a letter from a neighbor, in which, after referring to two 
such occasions, the writer said, " The hymns you sang 
in the Spirit never left me. God was calling after me, 
one of his children, but out in the world, — through you. 

1 cannot remember any thing for a number of years that 
took hold of my soul like those hymns. I desire to say 
some word from God that will comfort or help you, as, 
in times past, you were used in helping me. You are 
near the entrance of that new life. Chns: says, 'Whoso- 
ever believeth in me shall never die.' Hear Rev. i. 5. 6 ; 

2 Pet. i. 16, 17, iS; 1 Pet. iv. 12. 15: 1 Per. i. 1-4; 
Rom. viii. 37, 38, 39; John xiv. 26, 27." As these pas- 
sages were read, Mr. Harrington said, u It seems to me, 

brother N must have been inspired to quote these 

special passages for me in just this order, they give me 
such new light and strength.'' 

The next day a letter came from one of the patients of 
the insane-hospital, saying, " Your voice I have heard with 
delight preaching the blessed gospel of God's dear Son." 
This filled his heart with grateful joy, for though he had 
taken his turn with clergymen of the city in supplying 
the pulpit of the hospital very willingly, as a reasonable 
duty, yet he often feared that those to whom the preach- 
ing was especially directed were too much diseased to 
derive any real good. He rejoiced that God had allowed 
him to cheer at least one of those afflicted ones. There 
were other letters, for which, more than all, he thanked 
God with great joy. These were from former students 



1 64 MEMORIES. 

of the university, one of whom he had often mourned 
over, and prayed for with great longing, but with disap- 
pointed hope. The assurance that his words, though 
apparently unheeded, had not been in vain, gave him 
great comfort. 

On Thursday, the i ith, he lay very quiet for some time, 
when I asked for his thoughts. " I was thinking," said 
he, " of three hymns. Of that one by Ganse, — the 
283d of the Hymnal, — especially of the last stanza : — 

' Tell me much of cleansing blood ; 
Show me sin, but sin forgiven ; 
Step by step where Christ has trod, 
Help me home to heaven.' 

"Then the 220th, by Charles Wesley : — 

' O Love Divine, what hast thou done ? 

The incarnate God hath died for me ! 
The Father's co-eternal Son 

Bore all my sins upon the tree ! 
The Son of God for me hath died. 
My Lord, my Love, is crucified ! ' 

"I have been trying," said he, "to find one on the 
other side to match these, — a response of the human to 
the divine love. The only one I can think of, as com- 
ing anywhere near what I want, is this of Watts's, the 
2 1 ith : — 

* Were the whole realm of nature mine, 

That were a present far too small ; 
Love so amazing, so divine, 

Demands my soul, my life, my all.' " 



MEMORIES. 165 

A Christian friend called to inquire for him. When 

told she was down-stairs, he said, " Give sister W my 

love ; and tell her it is all bright here now, and when we 
get over there it will be brighter." 

He suffered every day more from difficulty of breath- 
ing and from extreme restlessness. On Friday Professor 
Van Vleck came in, and was, as always, most welcome. 
Mr. Harrington was greatly cheered by the faithfulness 
of his colleagues, and sometimes wondered that his long 
sickness did not exhaust their sympathy. He told Pro- 
fessor Van Vleck of his intense unrest. Then he added 
cheerfully, "But though the exterior is so restless, the 
interior is very restful. Professor, it is all rest within" 
A little later Professor Rice came and talked with him 
a while. Soon Mr. Harrington said, "Professor, I should 
like to hear you pray once more. I may have several 
opportunities, we can't tell, but I should like to hear you 
now." And most comforting were the words of praise 
and supplication offered to God. As Professor Rice rose, 
he said, " Before you go, tell me about those Seney bonds. 
A paragraph in the paper to-day looked as though they 
had appreciated again." And the confirmation of this 
good news for the college was just as pleasing as if he had 
been, as of old, identified with all the work of the uni- 
versity. The full conviction that he was near the end of 
earthly life detracted nothing from his appreciation of the 
importance of it. Life was to him the workshop where 
the great Master-Builder had placed his workmen, and 
there was nothing of the work given them to do that was 
not worth earnest and careful attention until they were 
called away to other service. 

All these nights he alternated between severe fits of 



1 66 MEMORIES. 

coughing, and moments of broken, heavy, tiresome sleep- 
ing. He talked almost constantly in his sleep, often 
fancying himself away on a journey, and piteously beg- 
ging to go home. Once he called out so joyfully, " After 
all, here we are home in the midst of friends. Praise the 
Lord ! " Waking or sleeping, he repeated passage after 
passage of Scripture, and many a favorite hymn, and 
often prayed with great earnestness. His last audible 
prayer in his sleep was on the night of Feb. 13, and was 
very distinct and coherent, ending formally with, "And 
now forgive us all our sins, and accept all our thanksgiv- 
ings, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen." The previous day, 
— Saturday, — after listening to a chapter from the Gospel 

of John, he said, " Now read me one of brother N 's 

quotations, — the one from Peter." I began the one in 
2d Peter. " No, no, not that, — the long one in the first 
chapter of 1st Peter. Read sixteen verses." As I read, 
he responded frequently with praises ; and when I ended, 
he said, " How full that is of strong doctrines ! " calling 
my attention to the fact that in those few verses the 
doctrines of the atonement, the resurrection, salvation, 
and eternal life in Jesus Christ, and his second advent, 
were all set forth. 

Karl came at noon, and much of the afternoon was 
spent in company with him. On Sunday morning he 
enjoyed listening to the sound of the organ in the room 
below, as Karl played at family prayers ; and said, when 
he went to him afterward, " Though I could not distin- 
guish the words, I could easily follow the music, and 
knew they were, ' Abide with me. 7 " 

That day he repeated with emphasis the last two lines 
of Philip Doddridge's hymn : — 



MEMORIES. 167 

" And crowned with victory, at his feet 
I'll lay my trophies down." 



My sister, sitting by, said, " Lay your burdens down? " 

"No, no; not burdens, but trophies" he replied. A 
little after, he said, " I am resting on a firm foundation. 
There is nothing in all this world so solid, so immovable, 
so satisfactory, as the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
Why, I know I am safe in him. The Word of God says, 
* Him that cometh unto me, I will in no wise cast out.' 
I have fulfilled the conditions, — I have come to him, and 
he keeps his word. The everlasting arms are under me. 
If there is a God, he is a God of truth. His word can- 
not fail. And that there is a God / know. 

" I have not the least fear or dread of death. Death 
is only the step over from this life into the life eternal. 

" I used to think the things about me, that I could see 
and hear and feel by physical sense, were the real, tangi- 
ble things ; but now I see spiritual things are the only 
real ones." 

When evening came we thought him unable to sit up ; 
but he pleaded, " I shall sleep better if I am in my chair 
for a while ; after a rest the night will be less tedious." 

He had not led in family devotions for some days ; but 
after taking his supper, he said, " Now, Karl, if you will 
read a very short Psalm, I will try to pray." Karl read 
the 121st, then his father prayed. Oh, how he prayed ! 
It was evidently a great effort for his lungs, but his voice 
was almost unnaturally loud as he for the last time per- 
formed the priest's office at his own family altar. Such I 
know he felt to be the case, as one by one he committed 
us all to God, and consecrated himself, his family, all our 



1 68 , MEMORIES. 

interests for time and eternity, to the great Father of us 
all. We felt we were laid on the altar, and for Jesus* 
sake God accepted the offering. 

The prayer ended, he was helped to bed ; and then he 
said, " Now, let me rest while you and Karl eat supper ; 
then I want to talk a little." 

He was waiting for us, when in a few minutes we re- 
turned, and sat close by his bedside. 

He began in trembling tones, and went back over his 
own life, tracing the wonderful leading hand of God in it 
all. He spoke of his early doubts in reference to a call 
to the ministry, — the question that so long troubled him, 
whether he ought to be in the active pastorate instead of 
a professor's chair. He expressed his final settled con- 
viction, that for him the latter position was one in which 
there was even a greater opportunity for Christian influ- 
ence and labor than anywhere else. He spoke of his 
great satisfaction that he had lived to see his son estab- 
lished in this calling, and should leave him knowing he 
was where he had great opportunity to work for Christ. 
That, he said, was the work of life. He was ambitious 
that his boy should be fully equipped for his earthly work. 
He wished him to use every facility to make and keep 
himself thoroughly qualified for all the demands of this 
growing age, and to use all his energy to make himself 
successful in his department of teaching. " But remem- 
ber always/' said he, " that there is a still higher goal to 
aim at, a far more important work to be accomplished. 
And wherever you are, let the spiritual welfare of those 
about you lie deepest in your heart." 

He spoke of his hopes for Karl's domestic happiness, 
and his pleasure that the chosen one was a child of God, 



MEMORIES. 169 

and worker for Jesus. He said, "I should have been 
very glad to live until your wedding-day," but with a 
smile added, " When it comes, Karl, I think I shall know 
about it. I think I shall be there" 

He dwelt then much on his own strong confidence in 
God and in the Christian religion. He said, " I would 
be a Christian, if it were only for the joy it gives in this 
life ; " and talked much of his great delight in the pres- 
ence of the Comforter now. 

He said then, " I am perfectly at rest in reference to 
my future. I know I am safe in Christ. We don't know 
what the future joys will be, but I think 1 1 shall be satis- 
fied when I awake with his likeness.' " 

He rejoiced greatly that we all rested on the same 
rock ; that he could leave his dear ones, knowing that the 
same God who had so wonderfully led him all his life, 
and blessed him fully, now it was closing, was the God 
in whom they trusted. He said, " In him you are safe. 
He will lead you, and I can leave you in his hands with 
perfect confidence that at all times ' the Lord will pro- 
vide.' " 

After talking more minutely on family matters, he said, 
" Well, I can't talk any longer ; and it is just as well, for 
I believe I have said all I want to." He bade us good- 
night, and tried to rest. For an hour or two he slept 
somewhat quietly ; then his breathing became more diffi- 
cult, the coughing more constant, and suffering more 
evident. The last part of the night, his feet became cold. 
He said, " Don't try to warm them, they do not feel cold 
to me." He knew evidently that it was the chill that 
could never be removed. When morning came, he said, 
" Karl must go to his work this morning. He is needed 



170 MEMORIES. 

at Wilbraham; and though I love to have him here, I 
ought not to keep him from his duties, as there is nothing 
he can do to relieve me." 

So their last kisses were exchanged, and good-bys said, 
while the death-angel waited. 

Then he went through his usual morning programme, 
not omitting the listening to the daily paper. About 
eleven he sank rapidly, and for a few moments was unable 
to speak, and we thought we had listened to his last 
words. But restoratives were administered, and he came 
back to us. His physicians, who were out of town at 
that hour, returned about two in the afternoon. A glance 
told them the truth, and with few words they left the 
room. 

As I went back to Mr. Harrington, after a few moments* 
conversation with them, he asked, "What did they tell 
you?" I said, " Do you remember saying to me a few 
days ago, that you would like to go home then, if it were 
God's will? " — " Yes." — " And do you feel just so still? 
Do you want to go to-day? " — "If I could live a year 
longer to preach and sing and pray, and work for souls, 
I would love to live. But I had to give that up some 
time ago ; and since I can only live to suffer, and cause 
suffering and care for others, I would rather go. Yes, I 
would like to go to-day." I told him his physicians 
thought he could live but a few hours longer. He closed 
his eyes, and for some moments was evidently prayerfully 
taking in the momentous fact. Then he whispered, 
"Praise the Lord /" 

Soon he said, " You have been writing some letters to- 
day. Will you read me a sample ? " I read one. It was 
only a word to prepare his near relatives for the severe 



MEMORIES. 171 

blow that must soon follow. "That is right/' said he, 
and added, " You will have to send telegrams to-morrow. 
You had better prepare a list of names now, lest you may 
not be so well able to think of all later, and may neglect 
somebody." I told him I had already made a partial list. 
"Read me that," said he. I did so, and he added 
several names that he wished to have remembered. Then 
he spoke of other arrangements that should be made, 
quite as calmly as he would have spoken if the journey 
he was about to take were to London, instead of the 
heavenly city. 

My sister, who had been with us for two months, light- 
ening all our burdens, came into the room ; and he called, 
" Minerva, the doctors say I am going soon. I want to 
say a few things to you that I shall not be able to say by 
and by. Give my love to all the kith and kin, and tell 
them I would be glad to answer all their letters separately, 
but they will get no more letters from me through the 
United States mail ; but — ' Are they not all ministering 
spirits? ' " Then he added, "You must hurry your letter, 
so to have it go out in the next mail." 

Said he, " I did mean to write to G myself, but I 

wish you would write for me. You know what I want 
to tell him. Tell him all about what a comfort this 
blessed religion is to me, and ask him to come to Jesus 
for the comfort he needs so much." 

Of a friend whom he highly esteemed, and for whom he 
had often prayed, he said, " I want him to be a believer 
in Jesus. What a power he would be for Christ ! I want 
you to carry him this message from me. Carry it either by 
word of mouth or by letter, as you choose. Tell him this 
from me : ' Come to Jesus in his own way ; come humbly, 



172 MEMORIES. 

and consecrate the rest of your life and service to him, 
and let us enjoy the heavenly mansions together.' " 

He heard familiar voices down-stairs. Said he, " The 
neighbors are coming in to inquire for me. Give them 
this message from me. Always say that I send Christian 
love to my neighbors, with a hope that we may be very 
close together in the heavenly world.' ' Just at night his 
friend Professor Prentice came into his room. He had 
been expecting him, and looked up so glad, saying, " I 
want you to pray again with me." I said, "Wait a little. 
I want him to do something else before he prays." Mr. 
Harrington looked reprovingly, but I persisted : " You 
have taken no nourishment since one o'clock ; and I 
think, after a glass of milk, you would enjoy the prayer 
better." — "I cannot; I cannot raise my head." — "But," 
I said, "I think Professor can lift you up." — " He could- 
n't do it," said he. " Why," said the kind friend, " I could 
do any thing for you, Professor; " and, lifting him in his 
arms, he held him firmly while he drank his last earthly 
food. Then they talked of the " home over there," and 
the dear ones awaiting ; and their prayers of faith once 
more went up together to the God they trusted. Their 
love had been cemented in sorrow, and death only fastened 
it more firmly. 

This was the beginning of Mr. Harrington's last prayer- 
meeting ; for soon Professor Van Benschoten followed, and 
tenderly committed the suffering one to the arms of the 
loving Jesus. 

His pastor, Rev. W. V. Kelly, whose welcome visits had 
been very frequent during all his sickness, came in a little 
later, and once more prayed the Father for divine aid for 
his waiting servant. Words of comfort followed ; and, as 



MEMORIES. 173 

he was about to leave, Mr. Harrington said, "Tell me 
once more about the new church. I did hope I might 
live to see it completed, but I shall have to give that up." 
He had watched its progress daily, through the reports of 
friends, since the first brick was laid ; and he did not forget 
it even when stepping upon the portal of the "house not 
built with hands." 

Though consciously so near death, he lost no interest 
in the things about him, and even retained his old fond- 
ness for humor. Early in the night, when we tried to 
give him a swallow of water, he said, " Now, let me tell 
you just how I can take it. Put it away down by the side 
of the bed, so, as my head lies off, I can just touch my 
lips to the surface." And with a merry glance at a dear 
nephew sitting by, he said, " I guess Bing. has drank 
water out of a brook before now. He knows how we do 
it." 

Between the hours of eleven and one, he suffered 
greatly. His position was continually changed, but he 
could find rest nowhere. His breathing grew more and 
more difficult, until I knew he feared, as I did, terrible 
agony at the last. He commenced a remark implying 
dread, but instantly checked it, and with earnestness re- 
peated, " The Lord is my light and my salvation : whom 
shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life : of 
whom shall I be afraid? " He closed his eyes, evidently 
in prayer ; and all my soul cried with him unto the Lord, 
" Take him not away in extreme suffering. I will hold 
him back no longer. Take him when thou wilt, only 
grant us this, that he may go peacefully." His restless- 
ness ceased. Pressing my hand with all the energy of 
the death-grasp, he said, " Glory be to the Father, and 



174 MEMORIES. 

to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost ; " and our voices 
united for the last time in the words, " As it was in the 
beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. 
Amen." 

Then he fell into a quiet sleep. There was no more 
restlessness, no more expression or indication of suffer- 
ing, no incoherent words ; but as a little child sleeps in 
health, so he seemed to rest from the hour of two in the 
morning until six. Then he suddenly turned his head 
to one side, a few times gasped very lightly, and we saw 
that " he was not, for God had taken him." His eyes 
were closed as they had been during that last quiet sleep, 
and his own smile was on his lips. 

Our prayers had been answered, and in gratitude my 
heart whispered, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath 
taken away : blessed be the name of the Lord." 

As I think of the last weeks of his suffering and weari- 
ness, exchanged for rest and triumph, these stanzas of 
one of his own hymns come to replace selfish longings 
by thanksgiving to our Father, who has given his beloved 
sleep : — 

Into those mansions pure and holy, 

Cometh tears nor pain; 
Followers of the meek and lowly 

Meet their Lord again. 
Singing are the angels, singing, singing, 

In that sinless land ; 
Ringing are the voices, ringing, ringing, 

Voices of a sainted band. 

Sorrow and sighing from the immortal 
Evermore are fled ; 
Joyfully at the heavenly portal, 
Shout the risen dead. 



MEMORIES. 17s 

Everlasting joy, all glorious, glorious, 

On their heads shall be, 
Everlasting life, o'er death victorious, 

Through a long eternity. 



It would be a relief to my own heart if I could ex- 
press at all adequately my gratitude to those who, in so 
many ways, blessed us during the days of my husband's 
sickness. The members of the university and their 
families, our pastor, and the members of our own church, 
neighbors and friends of every name, — these were not 
all. But many on whom we had not even the claim of 
acquaintance came to show their sympathy. Aged and 
infirm ones toiled feebly to our door to exchange words 
of Christian greeting, and little children brought their 
sweet smiles of cheer. The various tokens of kind re- 
membrance caused the patient sufferer repeatedly to say, 
"It almost pays to be sick, so to learn the wealth of 
human sympathy." 

His room was almost literally a flower-garden. He 
never failed to ask for the donor's name, and often feared 
his pleasure in the gifts would not be known. Once, when 
luscious fruits, tastefully arranged with flowers, were pre- 
sented him, he exclaimed, with moistened eyes, " What 
shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits ? For 
surely, though the messengers who bring all these gifts 
are human, the real giver is Divine." 

One morning in August, after looking about with pleas- 
ure on the profusion of fragrant flowers that brightened 
his room, a cloud came over his face, and he said, " Do 
you know what I dread? It is the time when these gifts 
will cease. These dear friends think that I am soon to 



176 MEMORIES. 

leave them, and their kind sympathy is expressed in this 
abundance of flowers. But I dread the time when I shall 
have lived on and on, until they have become weary 
waiting, — for they must he absorbed in their own duties, 
— and I shall miss them." I suggested that this was the 
season of flowers, and the abundance now caused his 
friends comparatively little sacrifice, and doubtless gave 
them pleasure ; but by and by, when the cold came, 
and the flowers withered, we would not expect them, and 
would know that the lack was not a change in our friends, 
whose sympathy surely was not limited by the flower- 
season. " I guess that is the right way to look at it," 
said he ; " and so we will enjoy them while we can." 

But the flowers never failed to come. The frosts came. 
Winter came with its cold and wind and snow. But 
flowers came too ; and as the days grew colder, their 
presence was sweeter. Only a few days before he went 
away, a dear neighbor brought a lily in bud, whose de- 
velopment he watched with much interest, directing its 
position to favor the sun's rays and his own view ; and 
when he closed his eyes to earth's beauties, the pure 
white lily was beside him. 

After his spirit fled to the land of perennial flowers, 
these unfailing friends came to place the bright, sweet 
things he loved upon his bier, and to strew them on his 
grave. God bless them, and lead them up where he 
can tell them better how precious were their ministra- 
tions ! 

Among such kind memorials as those of the Prohibi- 
tion Society of Middletown, the Xi Chapter of the Psi 
Upsilon Fraternity, and the Alumni of Wesleyan Univer- 
sity, it seems peculiarly appropriate for that of the Fac- 



MEMORIES. 177 

ulty, in which he had been a brother for nearly a quarter 
of a century, to be inserted here : — 

Wesleyan University, March 16, 1886. 

" We desire to place upon the records of the Faculty 
an expression of our sense of the loss we have sustained 
as a Faculty, and of the yet deeper sense of loss we feel 
as individuals, in the death of our colleague and friend, 
Professor Calvin Sears Harrington. For nearly twenty- 
five years, Professor Harrington had been a member of 
this Faculty. He had proved himself an accurate and 
etegant scholar, a careful and successful teacher. In 
the punctual discharge of all his professorial duties, in 
his constant concern for all the interests of the college, 
and his unselfish devotion to its welfare, he was a model 
or us all. 

" But it is as the friend and the Christian, that Pro- 
fessor Harrington will always be thought of first, and re- 
membered longest. The moral and religious tone of the 
college community was to him a matter of constant 
solicitude. It is probable that he was not absent from 
his Thursday- evening religious class-meeting more than 
half a dozen times in twenty years (except when he was 
out of town) ; and it was very seldom indeed that he 
failed to be present at the students' prayer-meeting on 
sabbath mornings ; while his own daily religious life was a 
guide and inspiration to all who knew him. His charac- 
ter was so sincere, and his disposition so kindly, that it is 
doubtful whether he ever gave offence to a pupil in his 
life ; and it seems certain that no student could pass under 
the influence of his presence for four years without being 
deeply impressed by the gracious charm of his character. 



178 MEMORIES. 

" To a degree very rare he united positiveness of con- 
viction with gentleness of manner, strictness of moral 
principle with kindness for the individual. In the coun- 
sels of the Faculty it used to be frequently noticed, when 
matters of discipline were under discussion, that no one 
would insist on so high and strict a rule of conduct for 
the student, but that no one was so forbearing and 
hopeful in his dealing with the individual offender. 

" Only those who had the privilege of knowing Profes- 
sor Harrington intimately, as most of us had, can under- 
stand the rare social charm of his character. A native 
courtesy and gentleness, a winning unselfishness and kind- 
ness of disposition, an active intelligence, and a culti- 
vated taste, a peculiar, ever-present humor, made all the 
more irresistible by a certain demureness of manner, — 
all these qualities combined to make Professor Harring- 
ton one of the most congenial of companions, as well as 
one of the truest of friends. 

" All the traits of mind and heart that won our admira- 
tion and love during the years of his active association 
with us, were only heightened and intensified during the 
months of weakness and weariness that preceded his 
death. And, now that he is gone, we find the memory 
of him a constant inspiration ; and as we think of him 
we say, — higher praise no man can give, — ' He was a 
Christian gentleman.' " 



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